AwakeMUD CE

LAW

Here is a basic crash course on law in 2064.  What laws are there now?
What weapon is legal to carry in the streets?  A good general rule of 
thumb is any weapon that is legal to carry in the streets of the United 
States today.  Not very many.  Knives under 10cm are generally legal, and 
are legal in 2064 UCAS (United Canadian and American States) territories 
such as the Seattle/Tacoma metroplex.  Sinsearach and Council Island 
territories are generally more lenient, but the officials there generally 
will frag anything that looks out of place.  The Tir Tairngire Peace Force 
guard their borders ferociously, so unless you want to take on their 
Paladin Corps trying to slip the border into Portland is generally not a 
good idea unless you got a good plan to get in there or have a special 
Visa issued by the Tir officials.  Corporations with high enough pull in 
the world are considered extraterritorial, i.e. they are basically their 
own nation unto themselves.  Therfore, jurisdicitons differ.  A clever
shadowrunner can take advantage of this by going onto megacorp territory 
when chased by Lone Star, then looking for a way out through another route 
to get back on the UCAS turf that Lone Star patrols.  Lone Star may not 
respect your rights, but they do respect extraterritoriality and 
jurisdictions, as they do not want to start a corporate war.
SINS also play a dominant role in the laws of the world of Shadowrun in 
2064.  If you do not have legal SIN (System Identification Number -- 
kinda like todays Social Security Numbers in the United States) you have 
no rights and do not exist.  Getting a SIN is an easy process as you can 
get them at any government or Lone Star office for a bribe, er I mean fee 
(not having a SIN is a felony offense, neat huh?) and blammo you now have 
a legal SIN, and can work, play, and for you shadowy types get weapon 
permits and such.  If you have a criminal SIN you can do very little 
legally and the cops go out of their way to make your life a living hell.  
If you have this problem, perhaps you can hire a decker to "upgrade" your 
SIN for you but it won't be cheap.  As for the corporate front, remember a 
corp has legal jurisdiection over any part of its complex, if the law 
broken is not federal (then it becomes an FBI affair in the UCAS).  So 
maybe it is legal to walk through Ares Macrotechnology's towers with a 
sidearm, but Renraku might geek you on sight for the same thing.  Or 
worse, as corporate punishments do often tend to be worse than UCAS 
sentencing.  You might end up getting 30+ years in a labor camp in some 
godforsaken hellhole of a country in Africa or Asia, where that corp's 
power is absolute.  So to maximise your chances of operating, as a 
shadow of the sprawl, (or shadowrunner if you will), it is well advised to 
keep a very low profile, keep your gear hidden and stashed until you are 
on the run itself.  Punishment in Tir Tairngire is even worse, as the Tir 
is officially a "constitutional monarchy" but in truth a dictatorship.

Here are some areas that do not draw too much attention from the Lone 
Star, that are within the UCAS territory of Seattle:

Puyallup Barrens
Redmond Barrens
Tarislar
Ork Underground
Chinatown

As you read that list you will realize that they are all dominated by 
gangs, the Mafia, and the Yakuza.  Security types don't patrol there very 
often, and tend to take a long time to get there if they show up at all.  
If you are being chased by the Star its probably a good idea to lay low in 
the Barrens or another place similar to it where they don't have much of a 
presence.  Places like Downtown Seattle, the Airport, Tacoma, etc are more 
normalized (less metahuman) so they get more attention from the officials 
to keep out the "undesirables".