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Author Topic: State of Shadowrun 6e today?  (Read 10202 times)

Shrieking Banshee

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State of Shadowrun 6e today?
« Reply #60 on: June 24, 2020, 10:01:56 AM »
A fundemental problem of Shadowrun is that Corporations owning their own lands and militaries isn't a benefit to them but a massive massive drawback. Militaries are SUPER expensive and make no profit without tax subsidy.

So it exists in this state of magical realism.

insubordinate polyhedral

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« Reply #61 on: June 24, 2020, 10:55:08 AM »
Quote from: Shrieking Banshee;1135985
A fundemental problem of Shadowrun is that Corporations owning their own lands and militaries isn't a benefit to them but a massive massive drawback. Militaries are SUPER expensive and make no profit without tax subsidy.

So it exists in this state of magical realism.

I dunno, consider Seattle and Atlanta right now. If the government undermines the police department, the people demand its abolition, and the officers all walk off the job, it becomes unsafe and difficult to do business. (There was some news recently about Seattle losing some significant business developments because of the unrest.) The corporations can't exist if they don't do business, so they start hiring private security -- like the rest of the wealthy people will do as the quality and availability of the public service declines. That seems like a plausible start to a feedback loop to me that ends with at least significant private security forces for businesses. It also creates a protection racket/incentive to work for the corporation, because all the poor sods around you can't afford policing, but at least you can go to work in a secured building and if you get promoted enough maybe get a company security detail along with your company car. And if we're in a fantasy game then the stretch to something more organized and militarized doesn't seem out of bounds.

Shrieking Banshee

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« Reply #62 on: June 24, 2020, 12:06:14 PM »
Quote from: insubordinate polyhedral;1135996
I dunno, consider Seattle and Atlanta right now.

They might make private security firms and sell them to the government. Notice the key element? Sell? And realistically if a corp can't do business it will just lobby to get cops re-instated. Much cheaper.
A corporations real superpower is finding a way to make government fit the bill for its failures and expenditures under a bunch of different names and reasons even without resorting to soft bribery. Selling to the government is the sweetest job ever (As long as your huge).

I can see something like Lonestar, but extraterritoriality is dumb.

KingCheops

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« Reply #63 on: June 24, 2020, 12:07:41 PM »
Washing out the Native elements was something of a mistake.  Could be my Pacific Northwest bias but I love the Salish and Haida look to stuff.  I agree that it was ridiculous to have the tomahawks and bows but a modern badass Native warrior is a cool aesthetic.

The MegaCorps only employ mercenary armies when they are outside of a functioning government jurisdiction -- sort of how the oil companies operate in real life.  You just need enough deterrent in your Seattle headquarters to make intruders regret their decisions but otherwise you let the non-Corporate employees pay for Lone Star/FBI and leave it to them.  Don't think of them as trying to be governments think of them as the parasites they are that are draining society for everything they can get.

Orphan81

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« Reply #64 on: June 24, 2020, 12:57:29 PM »
Quote from: Shrieking Banshee;1136007
They might make private security firms and sell them to the government. Notice the key element? Sell? And realistically if a corp can't do business it will just lobby to get cops re-instated. Much cheaper.
A corporations real superpower is finding a way to make government fit the bill for its failures and expenditures under a bunch of different names and reasons even without resorting to soft bribery. Selling to the government is the sweetest job ever (As long as your huge).

I can see something like Lonestar, but extraterritoriality is dumb.


"We Practically are the Military" OCPhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KPMdnicSen8

Companies like Lockheed Martin make money hand over fist selling military projects to other countries. The Megacorps in Shadowrun didn't stop selling their Military Merchandise to the countries around them.. It's just now they can use their toys on their hometurf to defend themselves too. Their are entire Mercenary companies that operate with their own equipment and are profitable as hell. There is absolutely nothing unrealistic about the Megacorps having their own Military Forces to protect their land. They make more money than the majority of Nations they sell to. They are Nations unto themselves. Most Corp Citizens make money in Corporate Script rather than being paid in Nuyen, which further helps them keep their own money in house.
1. Some of you culture warriors are so committed to the bit you'll throw out any nuance or common sense in fear it's 'giving in' to the other side.

2. I'm a married homeowner with a career and a child. I won life. You can't insult me.

3. I work in a Prison, your tough guy act is boring.

Shrieking Banshee

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« Reply #65 on: June 24, 2020, 02:16:51 PM »
Quote from: Orphan81;1136019
It's just now they can use their toys on their hometurf to defend themselves too.

WHY. That's the main point. People just do not understand just how goddam expensive military expenditures are. It's massively wasteful spending your not getting back. If you want the military to 'defend your turf' (from who?) bribe the military.

It's more a case of Shadowrun writers not understanding the economics of scale....and just economics in general. In the real world, mercenary companies are only profitable in places with massively destabilized military presences but those places don't have corporations operating there because well...It's massively unprofitable to operate there. The exceptions have monopolies on exclusive resources and they make money selling that stuff to stable places, not to themselves.

Your not arguing with me as much as just using motte and bailey tactics.

You bring up a real-life corporation, which as I mentioned makes all its profits selling to governments, which are the only things that can afford such massive expenditures because of taxes and inflation.

Shadowruns Corporations are effectively communist mini states which I believe is possibly the least effective and hardest to make profit and taxes government possible.
« Last Edit: June 24, 2020, 02:23:15 PM by Shrieking Banshee »

Itachi

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State of Shadowrun 6e today?
« Reply #66 on: June 24, 2020, 04:23:21 PM »
Quote from: Shrieking Banshee;1136036

Shadowruns Corporations are effectively communist mini states which I believe is possibly the least effective and hardest to make profit and taxes government possible.

Don't know how other corps work but in Pueblo Corporate Council each citizen is also a company shareholder. Dont know if that changes much though. I agree with your points.

Shrieking Banshee

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« Reply #67 on: June 24, 2020, 05:20:30 PM »
Like the Shadowrun scary image is that of a worker being born in a megacorps hospital and then die in a megacorp produced coffin.

Well, think about that coffin. Who makes that coffin? A dedicated wood factory assumingly owned by them.
What happens if a rival megacorp makes wood for cheaper? They can't buy that wood to reduce costs. They have to continue using their expensive wood to their own consumer base that can't make more of a profit from because they control how much they get paid.

The idea is they send in Shadowrunners to steal their secrets, but what if their secret is spread across many facilities and a forest that took 10 years to cultivate? Now the corp (after spending a ton of money on an expensive mercenary operation) has to spend years upgrading their existing factories or planting an equivalent forest.

Or what if like in the real world they simply purchased the cheaper wood? Saves time and money which corporations love. Corporations generally buy out their competition but stay specific to a single kind of product because overgeneralizing leads to bloat and inefficiency. The megacorps that in the real world produces like 90% of the food don't also own the factories that produce the glass and plastic used to make those products casings. Its usually from regional producers (because it's cheaper than long-distance imports).

KingCheops

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« Reply #68 on: June 24, 2020, 06:41:39 PM »
Quote from: Shrieking Banshee;1136074
Or what if like in the real world they simply purchased the cheaper wood? Saves time and money which corporations love. Corporations generally buy out their competition but stay specific to a single kind of product because overgeneralizing leads to bloat and inefficiency. The megacorps that in the real world produces like 90% of the food don't also own the factories that produce the glass and plastic used to make those products casings. Its usually from regional producers (because it's cheaper than long-distance imports).

They don't do that in your world?  I don't remember any source material whatsoever saying that Renraku only purchased Renraku wood products.  And the corporate books did in fact talk about vertical versus horizontal specialization and called out which corps were pursuing which strategy.  The Renraku employee/citizens would only be able to buy their wood coffins from the Renraku funeral homes in the arcology but the wood could come from one of the other megacorps.

Shrieking Banshee

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« Reply #69 on: June 24, 2020, 06:58:53 PM »
Quote from: KingCheops;1136091
I don't remember any source material whatsoever saying that Renraku only purchased Renraku wood products.

Because it makes no sense for them to make Renraku coffins. I said wood, I could have escalated to 'Coffins'. Why make a dedicated coffin making plant when Aztechnology makes cheaper wooden products?
To keep the profits 'in the house'?....But you're still playing Aztechnology for the wood, and have to pay for the expensive factory upkeep yourself.

This comes from a fundamental economic misunderstanding of prices and labour that's very keynesian

Ghostmaker

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« Reply #70 on: June 25, 2020, 08:13:22 AM »
Aztechnology is not the best corp to use for this comparison, due to their shenanigans in Aztlan proper (getting Aztlan to nationalize other corps' assets) which led to a full on tactical strike against major Aztech facilities by the Corporate Court and the other mega (AAA) corporations.

That being said, stop thinking of corp 'military' as traditional military forces. Think of them more like jumped up security personnel who, yes, can shoot you dead for stealing from the Stuffer Shack.

Marchand

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« Reply #71 on: June 25, 2020, 11:02:34 AM »
Quote from: Charon's Little Helper;1135741
Cyberpunk is only anti-capitalist to people who don't understand that there are more than two economic systems, and that corporate run government is neither socialism or capitalism.


The classic Cyberpunk background of an ever smaller number of ever larger corporations getting ever more powerful is just old-fashioned Marxist economics.

Quote from: Charon's Little Helper;1135741
Actually, the underground black market of the runners is much closer to true free market capitalism than it is to socialism.


Agree with that.
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Shrieking Banshee

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« Reply #72 on: June 25, 2020, 11:15:26 AM »
Quote from: Ghostmaker;1136202
Aztechnology is not the best corp to use for this comparison, due to their shenanigans in Aztlan proper (getting Aztlan to nationalize other corps' assets) which led to a full on tactical strike against major Aztech facilities by the Corporate Court and the other mega (AAA) corporations.
I know they just have a punchy name. Evo, or some other one or whatever.

Quote
That being said, stop thinking of corp 'military' as traditional military forces. Think of them more like jumped up security personnel who, yes, can shoot you dead for stealing from the Stuffer Shack.

They have personal fleets of aircraft carriers. They might as well heat their facilities with furnaces that burn pure money.

KingCheops

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« Reply #73 on: June 25, 2020, 11:49:08 AM »
Quote from: Shrieking Banshee;1136224
They have personal fleets of aircraft carriers. They might as well heat their facilities with furnaces that burn pure money.

Okay been a while since I have a real life but I don't remember this at all.  Citation needed please.

Shrieking Banshee

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« Reply #74 on: June 25, 2020, 12:20:40 PM »
Quote from: KingCheops;1136233
Okay been a while since I have a real life but I don't remember this at all.  Citation needed please.

Its Rigger 3 (Shadowrun 4th Edition). But other stuff mention corps leasing navy stuff FROM the Government.

Again its because Tabletop RPG writers rarely study economics.