[ArkangelWinter]

 I just joined today, and was wondering if anyone had tips on dealing with either of my 2 games.

The first group is currently made of a chaos mage (initiate 2) with Shapechange, Stunbolt, Sterilize and a ton of mental manipulation spells that he uses to play face. Even though his foci jump his Manipulation DP to 19, hes not too much of a headache, and neither is the technomancer/rigger.

What I cant seem to stop are the combat chars. Troll weapons expert with wired reflexes 2, Automatics DP14, Body 10 and 10/9 armor plus 2 for bone lacing and 2 for dermal sheath. He just wont go down, to anything but spells resisted by Will.

The other half of that duo is a vampire adept. 2 IP for vampire plus 3 for Improved Reflexes, and with max Agility, maxed Blades with Aptitude, and Improved Blades 2 (and custom grip), he's getting 5 passes where he regularly 2 hit kills even heavily armored and cybered opponents. The only real balance Ive found is his restriction to night action, but he uses a body suit and helmet to cirumvent that in rough neighborhoods.

[All4BigGuns]

Just have an NPC ally fire a rocket launcher. That tends to end badly. At least it did for one team I was part of once.  23 dice to soak and still got one-shotted in that attack. Fraggin scatter 

[ArkangelWinter]

Works fine on the troll, but I'm going to have to build one devil of an NPC to hit the vamp, and then hope he dies before regen. At least he's just a sneaking dodging blade machine, no other tricks up his sleeve

[Walks Through Walls]

Welcome to the boards. I hope you find them as helpful as I have. That being said here are my 2 nuyen worth of ideas.

One thing that might help is an ambush. Attack with an assault rifle and narrow long burst should hit. The troll still will have his soak pool, but no dodge so a good shot should do some damage, and I've found that once the ball starts rolling it picks up speed fast. Another strategy is to have an opposing mage mind control the troll. If he and the vampire square off it could get interesting. (and it will make the team more cautious next time)

Even with his vampire ability and adept powers the vampire should only have 4 IP(this is the games limit). This will slow the killing down some. Another thing is since he is a hand to hand specialist is remember that his movement rate is divided between all of his movements in a CT. So with 4 passes you take the total movement and divide by 4 to get how far he can move in a pass. My suggestion would be hit him from range.

Also like All4BigGuns noted explosives are nasty especially in enclosed areas.
Bugs or some of the other threats out of Street Magic could cause them some problems too especially the spirit types where it becomes an attack of will to do damage to them.

Hope this helps

[Mirikon]

See, this is why all Shadowrun DMs should cross-train in D&D. If the combat monsters have sunk that much into their combat abilities, how much room do they have for things like spotting and disarming traps? You want someone to have a really bad day? Enclosed space with multiple claymores set to go off when someone opens the door. Chunky Salsa in effect means even that Vampire is going to be feeling godawful, if not killed outright.

Then on their next characters, they might step back from minmaxing things, to cover the other bases.

[CanRay]

It is not the strongest of the species that continues evolution, but the one most able to adapt to the situation as it comes about.

[Walks Through Walls]

A perfect example of how effective explosives can be was in a recent game the team was getting ready to hit another group and thought they had surprise. They knew the "bad guys" were on the second floor. The group gets to the stairwell and starts to go in. Luckily for them the first character in noticed the two grenades that were spinning on the floor. (had been dropped on the previous IP) The team had two of the main combat character take severe damage and a third was hurt(a troll damage soaker) The rest of the combat was slow and painful with the team barely surviving.

[All4BigGuns]

Welcome to the boards. I hope you find them as helpful as I have. That being said here are my 2 nuyen worth of ideas.

One thing that might help is an ambush. Attack with an assault rifle and narrow long burst should hit. The troll still will have his soak pool, but no dodge so a good shot should do some damage, and I've found that once the ball starts rolling it picks up speed fast. Another strategy is to have an opposing mage mind control the troll. If he and the vampire square off it could get interesting. (and it will make the team more cautious next time)

Even with his vampire ability and adept powers the vampire should only have 4 IP(this is the games limit). This will slow the killing down some. Another thing is since he is a hand to hand specialist is remember that his movement rate is divided between all of his movements in a CT. So with 4 passes you take the total movement and divide by 4 to get how far he can move in a pass. My suggestion would be hit him from range.

Also like All4BigGuns noted explosives are nasty especially in enclosed areas.
Bugs or some of the other threats out of Street Magic could cause them some problems too especially the spirit types where it becomes an attack of will to do damage to them.

Hope this helps

Using an ambush, put them in a 10 x 10 room and have one opponent double tap two fragmentation rockets into the middle of the room. Have a couple more come in from the sides just after with Full narrow bursts. Between all that, the vampire and the troll should both be reduced to a fine paste (if not a fine mist).

[Mirikon]

One word: Snipers.

Yes, snipers. Plural. As in multiple snipers. Firing Barret 121s.

Other option? See how the vampire likes being in a domain aspected to insect spirits, with a few hybrids coming to call.

[Walks Through Walls]

The other ploy that I use that usually works is what I have termed with my current group the rule of escalation. It goes something like this, "Anything you do or use your opponents will also. The more insane your firepower/damage ability/ damage soaking ability the more likely you are to run into someone who can do the same or will take more drastic steps to try."

It has been so effective in my current game that I have had a couple of the players come to me and ask if I do ...... will this start start escalating things?

[Mirikon]

The other ploy that I use that usually works is what I have termed with my current group the rule of escalation. It goes something like this, "Anything you do or use your opponents will also. The more insane your firepower/damage ability/ damage soaking ability the more likely you are to run into someone who can do the same or will take more drastic steps to try."

It has been so effective in my current game that I have had a couple of the players come to me and ask if I do ...... will this start start escalating things?

And this, folks, is the mark of a great DM. Don't ban things that players use to abuse the system. Instill in them the almighty fear of a DM unleashing his wrath upon them, and then let the players police themselves. +1 to you, sir.

[Crimsondude]

Control their actions, put them out of their element, misdirect, confuse, distract, delay, and destroy.

1. Gas weapons. Drop Seven-seven or Ringu on them until they are puddles.
2. Engulf the vampire.
3. Possess the troll.
4. DMSO-liquid weapons (Alcohol for the vamp; Narcoject, MAO, and anything else you can imagine for the troll).
5. Hack their toys
6. Corrode their armor
7. Blind them
8. Deafen them
9. Disorient them
10. Drop them through something
11. Have them land in/under water (which really fucks with vampires)
12. Monowire
13. Sawdust
14. Disrupt them, throw powerful wind at them, make them incapable of exploiting some of their power
 


You don't need to be stronger than them, just smarter. Throw an enemy at them who has Divination.

[ArkangelWinter]

A nice trip to Bug City would fit in very well with our campaign, though I may find a way to remove the mage before trying the control trick. Not sure how the +1 thing works, but you've given me some good ideas.

James: I'm not even trying the hacking route. Not enoug high-tech toys to hack. Though the more I watch their technomancer play defense, the more I think she wasted her Submersion on Multiprocessing

[Smiley]

The question I would ask you is: Is the problem coming from inevitable gun fights (planned by you or easily foresaw) or the result of the PCs actions?

If gun fights are planned or unavoidable for any reason, for you and your players, a good challenge is what you guys need. Not bigger badder guys with even bigger fraggin' guns but challenge. Force your players into unusual situations, something they can deal with but are not necessarily equipped or used to. Think a little outside the box. Toxins specifically aimed at Trolls (if the story can explain it), chambers filled with suffocating and/or explosive gas, places really really cold or filled with electrical sparks, situations that will make them think twice about staying and shooting people. Or make consequences of shooting more dire. If they're invincible, their lovers, friends and family might not be. Or I can give you an idea by giving an example of what things my GM throw at my character Smiley. To make it short, Smiley is an assassin using cunning to reach his target up close and kill them with his bare hands (as an Mystic Adept, he's really good at it). He is really tough, magically resistant and really good at avoiding getting hit, so my GM really rarely bothers with tough fights and works on making it tough to reach it instead. My char had a target to kill, a paranoid scientist and engineer, a real genius, working as a freelancer for who pays most. He's a loner and doesn't even know how to fight but... The target had recently and secretly implanted himself with a device that would make everything he owns and himself explode upon his death. It took some planning and a lot more improvisation but I did it. I don't really need to mention how a bad idea it was to just snap his neck and collect the paycheck. Circumstantial difficulties or penalties will make your fights more challenging without trying to pit them against their equal.

[Crimsondude]

Then throw someone else's hacked toys at them; from emotitoys to runaway cars. Keep them distracted and off-balance.

I've seen characters with more karma than God get wrecked. The vampire is the biggest problem, but there are plenty of countermeasures for it.

Seriously, Ringu is a 20P, AP –4 persistent neurotoxin. It will kill damn near everything unless the vampire's Magic is 10 or higher. In which case you attack their Immunity.

If gun fights are planned or unavoidable for any reason, for you and your players, a good challenge is what you guys need. Not bigger badder guys with even bigger fraggin' guns but challenge.

Indeed.

Escalation is lazy and generally pointless in the long-term.