Shadowrun
Shadowrun Play => Rules and such => Topic started by: voydangel on <11-23-10/0031:37>
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What house rules do you use in your game (or have seen used in another game) that are effective at speeding up and streamlining game play? Specifically I'm interested in streamlining combat, but I am interested in hearing non-combat suggestions as well.
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My rule number one: Roll abstract tests. If something seems too complicated or weird for you and/or your players, just take a number out of your head (for ex. the character's Agility+Skill), and tell them to roll it, after assigning bonuses/penalties. In short - ignore the rules whenever needed. If you think the situation still needs a roll, make one up.
I use that rule in most of my games, and it worked so far.
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Agreed. For example, if your "200k Nuyen Combatcyberware" Sammy encounters half a dozen gangers, they die. If they have circumstances on their side, maybe let the Sammy role a few dodge rolls.
Mind you, I use this only if the situation is in clear favor of the PCs. If the opposition is evenly matched, go with the usual rolling. It encourages the players to think and be prepared and work to have the situational advantage ;)
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Doc, there's gangers, and Gangers. The '200k sammy' would bite the dust in the first round against half a dozen Ancients. If you mean the generic, punk-ass street trash variety, then remember even they can have second hand (sic!) warez and guns. So 6:1 is never a good thing, even for a '200k sammy'. A lucky shot can take him out. And they're in numbers, so a chance for that kind of turn of events is pretty high...
And even street punks have Edge.
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I use a lot of instant death rules. (I'm a bastard, what can I say.) It varies, but anything like buildings falling on you, armored cars running over your head, high-end lasers hitting you in the face, a gauss rifle or assault cannon shot to the face at point-blank range, somebody shooting/stabbing you in the eye when you're unconscious constitutes an instant death, and so on.
I know it doesn't apply to combat, but I also prefer rollplaying to die rolls when it comes to social stuff.
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Remember that Edge can fix any instant death problems the players may encounter.
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Only if I allow it. ;D
Really though, my group's on board with me. The high number of insta-deaths (and some other stuff) came about as a reaction to the stupefyingly unrealistic stuff that can happen in the RAW.
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Only if I allow it. ;D
Really though, my group's on board with me. The high number of insta-deaths (and some other stuff) came about as a reaction to the stupefyingly unrealistic stuff that can happen in the RAW.
If you're group's on board, more power to ya! I'm all for pushing aside some of the unrealistic stuff to support the group getting more engaged in the game world.
The flip side though, is that we're in a world where dragons and magic are considered "realistic", and people denying this are considered the crazies. Given that Hand of God includes the literal "intervention of the gods" (SR4A, pg. 75), I'm personally willing to hand-wave it. Especially when there are people who have survived point-blank execution style shootings, the gunman's hand flinched at the last second and it grazed off the skull, etc. I certainly won't bother rolling dice to see if the guy is dead if he doesn't spend any edge when you have him tied up and are shooting execution style. But, if he burns the edge, I'm willing to buy into the idea that something intervened on his behalf.
Just wanted to add my 2¥, if significantly limiting the Hand of God how you and yours like to run their games, don't worry about me & keep on gaming.
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So, the Passions are still around, it seems. :P
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Ya, i just had my table-top team escape from a building which was being raided by a swat team...and the encounter took up pretty much the whole morning ~ 4 hours. They also escaped pretty unscathed. I should have made it harder, but instead it was easy but time-consuming. Sometimes it feels like abstracting rolls is kind of like cheating and then you just ask yourself what's the point of even playing by shadowrun rules. I mean, if I abstract it too much and then one of my characters dies, even though they know that whatever the GM says is the way it goes, I still don't have as much cover as when I stick to RAW. The thing with SR4A is that either it's too hard or it's too easy. It's very similar to real life. Things get lethal fast.
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I have to agree, it's extremely hard to find that fair middle-ground where the combat is challenging, tough and (very) dangerous, without being flat out lethal, or just so easy that it's a joke.
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Exrtremely hard if you follow RAW, yes. Which is why my group and I decided to go with style and great scenes > RAW. Means a lot of cans of handwavium, but we enjoy it.
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Yeah, it's funny. I'm obsessed with reality and don't allow hand-of-god very often (just very, very rarely) yet I run things loose and fudge the rules sometimes to keep people alive and happy. *shrugs*
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Exrtremely hard if you follow RAW, yes. Which is why my group and I decided to go with style and great scenes > RAW. Means a lot of cans of handwavium, but we enjoy it.
would you mind sharing some (or all) of your house rules with the class? I'm interested to hear how people run their games non-RAW, hence the thread. ;)
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Well, you can also check out house rules in House Rules (http://forums.shadowrun4.com/index.php?topic=27.0).
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would you mind sharing some (or all) of your house rules with the class? I'm interested to hear how people run their games non-RAW, hence the thread. ;)
I wouldn't mind, except there are basically none. We (I and the player I trade the GM job with) go with our gut. A decision I make for one scene would allmost never be applicable to another scene. If the rules don't fit how I want the scene to go, they go out the window. As I said, handwavium. I wouldn't actually recommend this, unless you have a lot of experience with a) the world of the game you are playing and b) the group you are playing with. A lot of people don't agree with this style of playing, so make sure to let them know what they are getting into and if they are ok with it.
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would you mind sharing some (or all) of your house rules with the class? I'm interested to hear how people run their games non-RAW, hence the thread. ;)
I wouldn't mind, except there are basically none. We (I and the player I trade the GM job with) go with our gut. A decision I make for one scene would allmost never be applicable to another scene. If the rules don't fit how I want the scene to go, they go out the window. As I said, handwavium. I wouldn't actually recommend this, unless you have a lot of experience with a) the world of the game you are playing and b) the group you are playing with. A lot of people don't agree with this style of playing, so make sure to let them know what they are getting into and if they are ok with it.
Ahh, yea, I can fully appreciate that play style, it can be fun, but for my games, at least the ones that aren't a horror campaign, I tend to prefer a little more consistency. I do tend to use a bit of handwavium in my horror games though.
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Thats what I meant when I said it needs experience with the game world, otherwise you end up with dozens of versions of the same situations where the same procedure resulted in very different outcomes.