Best Place to Start Running?

[DireSickFish]

Greetings Chummers,

I've been very interested in the Shadowrun setting since playing Shadowrun: Returns. It seems to be a very different style of game to run than DnD. I'm a sandboxy DM that just preps NPCs and lets the players play off of them. That won't really work with the find job, investigate job, do job mentality that I think is part of Shadowrun. This means for the first time in my GMing career I want to use a pre-made adventure. What adventure would you recommend for a new GM with new players? What is the best way to become familiar with the rules? Is there any place for advice to new GMs of Shadowrun?

[TeChameleon]

Greetings Chummers,

I've been very interested in the Shadowrun setting since playing Shadowrun: Returns. It seems to be a very different style of game to run than DnD. I'm a sandboxy DM that just preps NPCs and lets the players play off of them. That won't really work with the find job, investigate job, do job mentality that I think is part of Shadowrun.

It actually might, you just need to prep your NPCs a little differently; as long as they have their own (heavily conflicting) agendas and goals, the jobs should arise fairly organically. Also, your runners can spot (or manufacture ) a need for a job and offer their services once the need is made obvious. It's a bit of a different mindset, but not necessarily different enough to warrant chucking your entire DMing style out the window.

This means for the first time in my GMing career I want to use a pre-made adventure. What adventure would you recommend for a new GM with new players?

I'm not the best person to ask, but I've heard the title 'Food Fight' as a good newbie adventure. Don't know much else about it, though.

What is the best way to become familiar with the rules?

Read sourcebooks until your brains dribble out your ears. Then play and get most stuff wrong anyhow

That was somewhat tongue-in-cheek, but actually fairly true now that I look at it. Just accept that it's got a learning curve that can be a pretty steep, and that it's not just one game, it's actually three different games that overlap like a Venn diagram (regular game, hacking, and magic). My early GMing (which is still ongoing, if I'm honest) ignored magic almost entirely and offered bare-bones, stripped-to-almost-nothing hacking.

Get into it, start your campaign, and find your groove. Depending on your players, of course, but I'd say don't sweat the small stuff and just let them know that you're learning too.

Is there any place for advice to new GMs of Shadowrun?

Here, of course, but I've also found the Dumpshock Forums pretty good overall.

Oh. For character building, Chummer is powerful, very flexible, and about as user-friendly as that implies (which is to say, not very. It's still amazingly useful, though).

And as a final note, at least in 4th edition, the 20th Anniversary core book has a 'master index' for all the 4th edition rule books (at least those published prior to it), which is rather handy. Shadowrun is absolutely terrible for scattering rules, gear, and errata over dozens of books >.<

[comicshorse]

This means for the first time in my GMing career I want to use a pre-made adventure.

It's a bit (ok a lot ) old but I started my Shadowrun G.M.'ing with 'Dreamchipper'. Its a simple plot with some corporate intrigue, high society stuff and lots of street level gunfights that hopefully the P.C.s can warm up on before they true the dangerous, subtle stuff

[LibraryOgre]

I'll add that it somewhat depends on what you want. Do you want a rules-shakedown, or do you want a leads-to-campaign adventure?

[DireSickFish]

I'll add that it somewhat depends on what you want. Do you want a rules-shakedown, or do you want a leads-to-campaign adventure?

Leads-to-campaign. I'm looking over Food Fight now and might run that separately just to get people familiar with rules, then do a character creation session and I'd need a leads-to-campaign adventure for that. I'm just plain and simple not going to have enough system mastery to come up with challenges for the PC's that are appropriate for the setting and game mechanics.

[Beleriphon]

Leads-to-campaign. I'm looking over Food Fight now and might run that separately just to get people familiar with rules, then do a character creation session and I'd need a leads-to-campaign adventure for that. I'm just plain and simple not going to have enough system mastery to come up with challenges for the PC's that are appropriate for the setting and game mechanics.

Which edition of the Shadowrun? Fourth or Fifth? I'm pretty sure there are some organized play adventures for fourth edition that are free on the official Shadowrun site. They form a loose adventure path of sorts in that they are vaguely linked together.

[DireSickFish]

Which edition of the Shadowrun? Fourth or Fifth? I'm pretty sure there are some organized play adventures for fourth edition that are free on the official Shadowrun site. They form a loose adventure path of sorts in that they are vaguely linked together.

Fifth edition.

[TeChameleon]

As an aside, Shadowrun has what's basically holodeck technology with the hot sims (except it's VR instead of holograms, of course), so you can link your 'practice session(s)' to the main campaign that way- players can experiment with their characters without needing to worry about (permanent) death.