What character do you usually build?

[MineralsMan]

I always find myself skipping a character type I'd want to play due to the npc's ... for instance, why would I make a gun-themed street samurai if it means I'd be leaving the brother behind. Seems to break immersion to just leave such an important character on the boat. Same goes for shaman, melee street samurai (due to the ghoul being more fun), etc etc.

Do you guys do the same or do you just build whatever you think will be most fun? What kind of builds do you usually play?

[Taberone]

I run Assault Rifle/Sniper Rifle combo imo

Assault Rifles are powerful because Full Auto WILL instakill or severely wound someone ontop of flushing them out of cover

Sniper Rifles pair well with Assault Rifles because you can snipe anyone outside of cover (or flanked) and absolutely wreck them with critical hits

I usually have Duncan use Full Auto to flush enemies out of cover while I use Sniper Rifles to get a critical hit on them for massive damage

[Shinno]

A decker chromed up to his metahuman ears is probably the only choice for me since I dislike npc deckers for some reason. I really like adepts though and it's closest "class" para mi but it is quite unfun...

[bertpeal]

Even back to the PnP days, I mostly run Street Sammys, but that's because I am a tanker/ melee type player. If my Sams are ranged, I go with assault/sniper rifle combo until he vindicator becomes an option. A Chromed out Troll Street Sam carrying 2 vindicators into the fray is a truly frightening experience for the other side I can only imagine. Especially if one of your chrome pieces is an auto reloader....lol
But, if I go with a melee sammy, I get chromed out and use cyber affinity with ares hand razors until either the mono filament, sword, axe or whip becomes available. Think Wolverine meets Robocop meets Johnny Mnemonic all in one toon.

If I still want to melee but without the chrome, I use an adept with Chi casting, close and unarmed combat and thrown and melee attributes emphasized using katana, throwing knives and shurikens as well as spiked knuckles for my weapons. Until the special Chinese war swords open up.


Now if I am not playing melee, I generally run a decker/mage that specializes in lightning magic because of one and only one spell, CHAIN LIGHTNING. I have not played any other archetypes yet because they really never appealed to be, to be honest.

[dwarfpcfan]

Mages, nearly always.

[bertpeal]

Originally posted by dwarfpcfan:

Mages, nearly always.

Sounds a lot like me, but I finally figured out, half the fun is doing it all over again as something you aren't used to playing. It opens up an entirely new dimension of the same game and dialog when you look at it through a different point of view.

[Wayz]

Elven/Decker/Rifle. I hate the over sized cartoony ears the artists always give elves in Shadowrun and generally dislike elves in general but they have the highest quickness and speed is what I am after.

[Big Blue Dude]

First character I ran was this Orc named "Chairman" that used that one portrait with the fly suit and the side-combed hairstyle.

Pumped everything into charisma for ettiquetes, just enough into strength to use the heaviest weapon in the game (think it was called like a handcannon or something, could two shot those super-heavy robots in the last battle of the extended campaign) and then everything else into gunplay for rifles.

The games always kind of incentivize you to be the guy that can talk somebody down, especially Dragonfall, but beyond that you can play however you want. Don't think of building a character as being redundant depending on who's on your team, but who you can bring now that they don't need that slot.

You should always have a decker no matter what, so either you can take that role yourself and build someone with better aim than Isobel and her potato launcher, or just use her but risk her being generally trash in meatspace combat.

Street Samurai are always useful no matter what. The Decker is a necessity, but running a rifle or melee character and bringing along Duncan and the ghoul samurai is totally valid too. It's not doubling up on hard-hitters because you always need damage. It's rare that you'll do a mission completely bloodless, rarer still that you won't run into waves of enemies or timers. When I brought along a fully automatic rifle with the full clip skill and that special laser rifle you can get from a mission for long range kills, then had Duncan go full auto in medium range, we might as well not have had a fourth member. We were unstoppable.

[steelcoresoviet]

The cyberware options in HK are very robust, so I ended up with a character to take advantage of that. In this case, a charming troll with a focus on shotguns.

Duncan and Gaichu could barely keep up, but a properly specced Kolschei is a beast.

[Lumino]

I usually play Deckers, but not in HK because Is0bel is really good and money is a serious limiting factor. Usually I will go rifles, but I've also done Chi Casting, Mages and Cyberwhip waaaaay back when it was broken as ♥♥♥♥ when the game first game out.

[masterofflys]

I pretty much always go with a human/elf decker/rifle build - it's just very good at handling most situations, and PC deckers are usually more useful that NPC deckers.

For Hong Kong specifically though, I adjust the build slightly - drop a small amount of initial karma into spirit control/summoning to allow my character to carry fetishes to boost their charisma stat - I sacrifice one etiquette this way, but can meet all the usual charisma checks otherwise, saving a not insignificant amount of karma while doing so. Being able to have your character periodically trigger summoned spirits in the environment, and access dialogue options that a decker usually wouldn't get (spirit plane, third eye type stuff) is also a nice bonus. Late game, I also flood my character with as much cyberware as I can possibly fit/afford.

The money to make all this happen is extremely tight, of course, but it's just about doable if you hold off on upgrades until the really good stuff comes along in the mid-late game, and if you're going the talky route, there aren't too many fights you can't handle prior to that point. I think Gobbet's personal run with the rat king was probably to toughest challenge iirc.

[bertpeal]

Originally posted by masterofflys:

I pretty much always go with a human/elf decker/rifle build - it's just very good at handling most situations, and PC deckers are usually more useful that NPC deckers.

For Hong Kong specifically though, I adjust the build slightly - drop a small amount of initial karma into spirit control/summoning to allow my character to carry fetishes to boost their charisma stat - I sacrifice one etiquette this way, but can meet all the usual charisma checks otherwise, saving a not insignificant amount of karma while doing so. Being able to have your character periodically trigger summoned spirits in the environment, and access dialogue options that a decker usually wouldn't get (spirit plane, third eye type stuff) is also a nice bonus. Late game, I also flood my character with as much cyberware as I can possibly fit/afford.

The money to make all this happen is extremely tight, of course, but it's just about doable if you hold off on upgrades until the really good stuff comes along in the mid-late game, and if you're going the talky route, there aren't too many fights you can't handle prior to that point. I think Gobbet's personal run with the rat king was probably to toughest challenge iirc.

That's a good strategy, but I will tell you whatever build you use, buy both the regular and smart version of the weapons. And buy all the different types of armor of the same rating This allows you to
1) loan a better weapon and armor to your npc teammates at the beginning of each mission to make it easier to beat the mission
and
2) recycle the weapons and armor. Every time a better option comes out, buy it and sell the inferior ones to recoup some of your money unless you want to continue loaning it to your npc teammates.
And if you don't mind bending the rules a little and money is tight, hit ctrl and f1 at the same time to open the debugging menu and give yourself as much money as you want.

[< blank >]

I'm a sucker for adepts and SRHK is the best of the series to play them in, not least because of the special swords and blood calls to blood. Essence affinity also allows you to finally get a little bit of cyberware, and allows non-dwarves to finally learn martial resisance 2.

[Morphine Cat]

I like to play a mage. They fit nicely with the range of skills available with the given team, and since you end up not advancing your party members if you replace them with mercs for hire it feels like you kind of need to bring them along.

Having the ability to both heal and provide a great deal of damage is useful while allowing the Decker role to go to the default NPC, brother fills in the Samurai slot, and rat girl is well...rat girl. She's not the greatest character, but her summoning ability comes in handy in some places.

[Cryptic]

Decker/street samurai. Almost like a modern spec ops hacking specialist. Loved it.

[Tola]

Being the street samurai with a deck and a glib tongue is definitely the best overall concept here, but it doesn't work in the (5th edition) tabletop version.

There are six skills that all have some use in the Matrix, you probably want a minimum of three social skills and let's say pistol for your combat because you can talk your way through a security checkpoint with most varieties of those and a decent fake SIN with a firearms license attached to it. You have a maximum skill of 6 at character creation and really want to be there or nearly there with any skill you take, which means... 60 points, you could almost manage if skills are your B priority but will be rapidly dropping in effectiveness if you want to buy higher skills in even half of these while the no-charisma samurai pumps his automatics, blades and the physical attributes he hasn't maxed out.