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Dumpshock Forums _ Shadowrun _ Recorded my last session

Posted by: MaxMahem Jan 2 2008, 11:38 PM

So I recorded my last session. The audio quality was not great, but mostly legible (the biggest problem was we maxed out the mic when we got a little heated). And I was wondering would anyone out there on the net be interested in listening to this? An actual example of how a typical (or at least typical for us) play session of SR4 might go? I'm at least interested on getting some feedback on how our style is, and how it might be improved.

Posted by: Karaden Jan 2 2008, 11:57 PM

Sure, link away or something.

Posted by: Fortune Jan 2 2008, 11:58 PM

What's the size, format, and length of the file?

Posted by: knasser Jan 3 2008, 12:23 AM

Link. And if you need hosting / bandwidth, I have more than you could ever use.

-K.

Posted by: MaxMahem Jan 3 2008, 12:56 AM

Okay, I'm uploading it now.

Its a recording of a typical game session of me and my buddies (7 of us at the table). It's roughly 3 hours long (no need to listen to the whole thing you can surely skip huge chunks), and somewhere around 50mb in size. Though I don't think I managed to get the whole thing on tape. Sound quality is only fair at best, we maxed out the mic when we got exited.

I'm really putting it up here as more of a case study in what some average guys average RP session might be like. Thought some people might find it interesting, and would be interested in getting some comparisons to how everyone else sessions go.

I'll post a link when the upload finishes.

QUOTE (knasser 'the generous to strangers')

Link. And if you need hosting / bandwidth, I have more than you could ever use.

Thanks, if people like this I may take you up on it.

Posted by: MaxMahem Jan 3 2008, 05:01 AM

Sorry it took so long, there were... complications.

Anyways I had to split it into two parts, but the first part is up.

Check out http://maxmahem.podbean.com/.

Posted by: MaxMahem Jan 3 2008, 10:52 PM

Not sure if anybody has actually listed or got through the first half, but I have the second half up. I'm going to go ahead and do this again next Monday, hopefully with better results.

Would it be against forum etiquette to cross-post this is in the other forum branches?

Posted by: knasser Jan 3 2008, 11:48 PM

I've just finished downloading them and am looking forward to listening to it, but wont have the time for the next couple of days, I think.

Will post back when I've done so.

-K.

Posted by: DTFarstar Jan 4 2008, 03:36 AM

I got about halfway through the first half before I had to stop for awhile. Sounded pretty typical except that your players know more about the world and don't derail things as often as mine do.

Chris

Posted by: knasser Jan 4 2008, 07:15 PM

Am listening to it now. Quality is pretty good. I don't think I want to know what your team did to make Ares stock drop 20%.

Posted by: Nightwalker450 Jan 4 2008, 09:37 PM

I just finished listening to it at work. And enjoyed it, closest I can probably get to gaming at work (other than browsing these forums). It also helps to get ideas for future runs by listening to others (and less consuming than reading).

Posted by: Dayhawk Jan 4 2008, 10:05 PM

Cool. Makes me ALMOST want to record my sessions.

Your players are pretty well on task compared to mine as well.

Two things I noticed.

1) It sounds like the number of dice your players are rolling are alot less then what mine. Around the 6-10 range, while alot of my players end up rolling around 15-18 or so.

2) Your players are also more willing to accept the way the plot is going. There is ZERO chance my players would get on a plane and go in the meat for any sort of meeting. (Though I had a hard time knowing if your group didn't really have a choice)

Overall pretty cool.

Posted by: DTFarstar Jan 4 2008, 10:37 PM

Yeah, what the hell did they do, by the way?

Chris

Posted by: knasser Jan 4 2008, 10:45 PM

Heh! Quote of the day is player to Damian Knight:

"Yeah, we ah, my matrix associate decided it would be a good idea to shoot her and my other associate, who was on a lot of drugs at the time, ah, he also decided to shoot her. And I wasn't able to stop him. There were drugs. And we killed 37 people. Um. Yeah,"

Posted by: MaxMahem Jan 4 2008, 11:34 PM

QUOTE ("DTFarstar")

I got about halfway through the first half before I had to stop for awhile. Sounded pretty typical except that your players know more about the world and don't derail things as often as mine do.

Wow, really? I thought those were two of the issues we struggled with the most! I often feel like we could get twice as much done if we didn't get derailed as much. Also while we have been playing Shadowrun for a LONG while (just recently came back to it though) I'm not sure if all of my players have in depth knowledge about the time line, though they have rough idea of the basics (most of them). I do agree that we are pretty up on the setting however, having played it for a while.

QUOTE (Knasser)

Am listening to it now. Quality is pretty good. I don't think I want to know what your team did to make Ares stock drop 20%.

QUOTE (DTFarstar)

Yeah, what the hell did they do, by the way?

It's covered briefely towards the start of the clip. Basically the end of the last run cumulated with an an possible technomancer/entity (exact nature withheld, my players may read this thread and still don't know) who (for reasons still unknown) led a large group (~150 people) of BTL addicted/manipulated persons on an attack on one of Ares facilities (primarily an office building) in downtown New York (Manhattan).

I had planned for this to end up as an all out brawl between my players and the BTL addicts. Of course this didn't proceed as planned. Instead one player one shotted the technomancer (blowing his brains to bits) and fled from them, a group broke off to pursue. The other players came to his rescue by literally running over about 25 of them (aided by a a Chaotic World spell), and then deciding to proceed on and ROLL his (large) truck into the large mob that was attacking the facilities. Killing a great deal more of them.

Luckily they had the foresight to let one of their Ares contacts know about the attack shortly before it went down (like 5 minutes or so). So not to much longer after the crash (while Bubba was getting pounded by swarms of BTLers) an Ares Firewatch team arrived to clean up the mess.

Anyways net result was the players were responsible for a good 35 or so people bruttaly literally massacred on the steps of one of Ares facilities, while about the same number were seriously (as in arms of legs mangled or missing) injured. Which caused quite a scandal for Ares, causing the stock hit (probably only temporary really). Luckily for the players during the attack most of the local matrix was crashed by the entity and the powerful Chaotic World spells were enough to keep their names out of the press. Ares, of course, still wanted answers. Hence the run.

QUOTE (Nightwalker450)

Glad you enjoyed it. I'm going to do it next Monday as well, if people continue to show interest I may make a regular thing of it.

QUOTE (Dayhawk)

Your players are pretty well on task compared to mine as well.

Again I am amazed by this, as I find we are off task a lot.

QUOTE

1) It sounds like the number of dice your players are rolling are alot less then what mine. Around the 6-10 range, while a lot of my players end up rolling around 15-18 or so.

Yeah, it does seem we are run at slightly lower power then typical, which I am encouraging. Most players criitcal skills are in the 10-14 range, while other skills are in the 6-10 range you list. Of course for some things (like decking) I may be missing some bonus dice players are owed, but I'm pretty sure I've got them them right.

QUOTE

2) Your players are also more willing to accept the way the plot is going. There is ZERO chance my players would get on a plane and go in the meat for any sort of meeting. (Though I had a hard time knowing if your group didn't really have a choice)

Well I was prepared for them to object to their treatment. In retrospect, it was one of things I was disappointed with in this run, I felt like I railroaded them a good bit in the meeting with Damien Knight (which I also think I could have handled better). I mean what did I expect them to do when heavily armed bad-asses show up at their door?

Posted by: knasser Jan 5 2008, 12:16 AM

Well I see that it is universal that players who are happy to take on any anything else, point blank refuse to ever attack a sexy and apparently unarmed woman who's on her own.

Posted by: DTFarstar Jan 5 2008, 11:55 AM

MY group is sadly only me, two of my friends, and one of their girlfriends who says she wants to play with us, but rather than actually enjoy our company or want to play because she enjoys it, she is rather paranoid about her boyfriend having fun AT ALL when she isn't involved in some way. Doesn't help that this is basically the only time of the week we see each other so there is alot of catching up to do. I think we probably only stay on track for about 1/4th the session unless it goes really well. We've had several sessions we called off after a couple hours to just sit around and hang out and talk about our weeks.

Chris

Posted by: MaxMahem Jan 5 2008, 11:29 PM

Update it with a set of 20 Questions with one of my players, Carey, who plays Griff. Griff and Bubba are two of my more homicidal players this time around, but the interview went pretty well I thought. So enjoy.

Posted by: MaxMahem Jan 9 2008, 02:49 AM

I've loaded up the recording of my last session as well. This run went pretty well, but my recording technique still needs work. Opinions are very welcome! If anyone has any questions or wants some more data on my team let me know, and I'll try and fill you in.

Check out http://maxmahem.podbean.com/

Posted by: DTFarstar Jan 9 2008, 11:56 AM

I'd kill for character sheets. I like being able to see stuff like that. Also, keep up the good work. I would help with recording technique if I could, but I know nothing about it.

Chris

Posted by: MaxMahem Jan 10 2008, 09:39 PM

Part two is going up now. Due to space limitations the Part one of my last session had to come down.

Character sheets will have to wait for a bit, I have some electronic copies of them, but they are out of date. I haven't got around to updating them quite yet. This last session did end us in a good place to update these either.

Posted by: Eugene Jan 11 2008, 12:30 AM

Good stuff! Love the dialogue!