So my players went on a run into the heart of the Yucatan. They fought Aztech heavy infantry, they stole millions of dollars of military equipment. They ran like bitches when the cavalary came in with gimble mounted 20mm depleted uranium death. They planned for something like 3 hours IRL, they called in all their favors, pumped all their contacts, and even did some mini runs to lay the groundwork for this raid.

As far as I'm concerned, they did everything right and were rewarded for good RP and good planning/execution.

Except for the guy who tried to steal "The Secrets To Aztechnology Blood Magic" ™.

This guy is new to the game and I've gone to great lengths to explain to him that this isn't D&D and his character, while incredibly powerful is not a "hero" in the d20 "I thwack with YES damage". Magic is dangerous, things crawl around on the astral plane and eat you, etc etc etc.

He is however a guy who has DMed various system for years and is far from a complete newbie to gaming in general. He also claims he's read and really like "Neuromancer"

Anyways, there was an Azzie blood mage and his ritual center on this base. They successfuly "disabled" him (read: they snuck up while he was busy and blew his entire observation dome into another time zone). I ruled that the charges they set pretty much surgicall removed the area where this mage was operating but generally left all the other creepy areas functionally intact. I mentioned that there were some computer terminals.

He got a drone to run up the side of the building, into the smoking aftermath and "download everything they have on blood magic".

So it did.

Which I translate to mean "The advanced computer system that manages their magical database noticed an obvious and retarded intrusion and promptly uploaded a dummy file filled with psychotropic IC".

This guy clearly states "When I have a moment I'm going to read through this information". So during the ride home I say that he jacks in, using his off the shelf non-upgraded firewalled commlink.

So here's the question I have. Is it fair to say that a psychotropic IC is capable of implanting the suggestion "Call Aztech Field Office X and spill your beans about how you came in contact with this information, than go back and amend your commlinks vocal logs to reflect that you did indeed make the call but didn't actually name names or give locations"?

Also, am I wrong for treating the techniques used for Azzie blood magic in much the same way that a nation would protect it's nuclear secrets?

I wouldn't think they would have it on a database like that, but that might just be me. Maybe show and trappings, but not he real deal.

They stole millions of (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nuyen.gif) ? I would say you are being very fair, after all they do have to live to spend it. Your group should be looking forward to a bright and possibly short future of running like hell away from the worst Aztlan has to throw at them.

Well that's what I tried to explain to the player without saying "You are not getting blood magic because that's fucking retarded" I spent the better part of 10 minutes explaining that blood magic is the magical equivalent of nuclear weapon tech and that "appropriate" and "smiliar" precautions to protect them would be taken.

ie. Sending a drone to jam a dataspike into a random dataport and use it's rudimentary search function to run "I wantz blud magik!" is going to get... not blood magic.

And I agree, I highly doubt that they would keep any substantial amount of data in the field where it could be stolen in a raid *cough cough*. The mages in charge would certainly have notes and maybe a few blood magic specific formula but nothing like "Everything you need to summon you're own unstoppable blood spirit". Furthermore you would need a dedicated and talented hacker to wack the IC guarding it and crack their encryption.


And yes the players don't seem to realize it but when the GM gives you lots of "free stuff" it usually isn't free.

But hey, they're all partying in the Caribbean Leauge for the next couple of days. What do they have to worry about.

I other news, increased activity at "Pyramid" in the Seattle Metroplex...

Remember your player about the million nuyen bounty on blood mages, if that doesn't make him change his mind, well, his not going to last long time anyway without being captured or killed.

Alright first off don't worry about your player suddenly being a blood mage. The rules are quite clear

"This metamagic may only be learned with the aid of an instructor
of the same tradition or a free spirit who knows and is
willing to share the technique. It can never be learned through
self-initiation."

Meaning that whatever he just got isn't going to let him pick the stuff up.

This means you don't have to screw him over. Honestly I'd just roll some dice as appropriate with realistic ratings, and let things fall where they will.

If he does manage to get the file and clean it of danger than it would have interesting information. Maybe on specific practices, maybe some research results, maybe some names of sacrificed people.

If you want to have things be exciting maybe have someone in there instructions for the construction of a blood spirit forumla. Or perhapse the location of one. But I might avoid that.

Blood magic isn't the magical equivalent of nuclear weapons, it is just a way to reduce drain. Really, sacrificing is just like centering only significantly more messy. Bloodzilla, as much as we rail against him, was a mistake resulting from the fact that the various rules were written by several different people. If you put the reasonable and intended limitations in as a house rule then blood spirits are not unbalanced.

Blood Magic isn't much of a state secret as it is a religious secret and can legally only be practiced by certain well-trained Aztec priests. It wouldn't be terribly difficult to steal one of their libraries. The only problem is that a magician wishing to learn blood magic needs someone to guide him through the process. Magic in the Shadows (superseded by Street MAgic but still perfectly valid where the two don't conflict) clearly states that people who learn blood magic without the assistance of a group or a sane metahuman instructor invariably go insane. PCs that go insane automatically become NPCs.

He might be able to glean some insight from the blood magician's computer databases but it is highly likely that the good stuff would be limited to hard copies written in human blood on parchment made of human flesh. Even if it were a blood magic how-to guide he probably wouldn't be able to make heads or tails of it without the assistance of an Aztec priest or someone taught by one.

Ah... well I guess I might be overselling it than. But with the bounty and all...

I'm not at all worried about him becoming a blood mage. In fact if he wants to that's fine.
I just hope he realizes that this will make him into an NPC subject to dark and terrible forces beyond human understanding.

Oh, if he somehow found someone to teach him aztech blood magic, wouldn't that force him to change traditions? That'd really piss off his mentor spirit too right?

Actually, yes they are. Force becomes bigger and more important the more you have. The ability to reduce drain (which pushes what you can summon) and then have the spirit jack its force even higher is totally obscene. Not as obscene as the original printing, but it's still fucked. Blood Invocation is a broken metamagic.

That being said, blood magic is available to a lot of traditions. In fact, all of the "old magic" is blood magic as people define it in Shadowrun. Blood magic is probably where everyone is going eventually. But it's different for every tradition. An Astartu doesn't do the same things to use Sacrificing that an Aztec Priest of the Sun does. Stealing the blood secrets of a different tradition is almost completely useless unless you were so far behind on your own research that you didn't even know sacrificing was possible.

All in all, players learning Sacrificing is basically OK, although it's very powerful. Blood Invocation is still bigger than Great Dragons, so I would keep it off limits.

-Frank

Most important is the "cannot be learned without an instructor or free spirit line." You don't even have to cock-slap this guy with psychotropic black IC, because unless he was hacking in Hot SIM, the IC won't affect him.

A databomb that ruins his commlink is fine, tho. Or worms his system and sets the azzie dogs loose on him, alternately.

I would see Aztechnology hiring a group of major Shadowrunners to go and kill the team, their family, and their friends. If this really is the equivalent to nuclear secrets I would expect that Aztechnology just dropped 1 million nuyen for each killed member of the team to a very serious team. It is not that they actually stole something useful - it is the principle of the matter.

This is not Aztechnology going out and putting it up in bulletin boards. This is Aztechnology being very discrete to make sure that even the mention of something being stolen from Aztechnology is wiped out.

They may walk into a bar and may never walk out again except as indiscreet bits of exploded flesh.

Well I wasn't too clear on that. I figured if black hammer works in cold VR than psychotropic IC would probably work pretty well in cold VR as well.

I think I might arrange for his mentor spirit to point him towards his own traditions form of blood magic.

say hello to his twisted twin for me *g*

Eh?

*face palms*

Wow I'm slow there, thanks.

While I certainly agree that the player's 'plan' to aquire blood magic was a bit underthought (though, in his shoes... sudden inspiration+lack of planning=wonky idea on the spot... been there in less reasonable circumstances)

Deciding that they've got cool psychotropic ice haunting ever computer at ever field site on the off chance someone does something dumb retroactively is, to my mind, so no the way to handle it.


Just ask yourself this: Would an expirenced, practicing Blood Mage actually keep a 'Blood Magic For Dummies' primer in his computer in his lodge? Why?

I mean, sure, dumbass drone plan may not have been a great way to retrieve data, but honestly assess what sort of files would actually be there and how valuable (not very...) they are likely to be.

Well this isn't some random field site, this is a temporary airfield. He didn't hit any random terminal in the building, he hit up a terminal in what I described as the mages study. He didn't say "huh, that's odd, no encryption?" when I said the drone "Easily gets the data."

And he didn't get jack diddly because I absolutely agree with you, there's no goddamn way they're just going to leave that sort of thing laying out. At best he's (the blood mage) probably got some personal notes to help him keep his shit straight during rituals. I do think that whoever put his terminal together would have the foresight to consider "Hey, what if an unauthorized user tries to jack in here and gank his notes?" I do think than an experienced practicing mage is going to have some decent security that will detect someone trying to scam for paydata.

Or he might not have psychotropic ice at his notes at all. If I wasn't a matrix pro I'd stay far away from that stuff on my personal comlink.

But as said, the best he will get is ritual notes and some background info on blood magic. Let him have it, as it won't change anything except a big target sign above him in case he spreads the data.

This is where shadowrun lacks some kind of explosive rune or sanity system to punish the runners for reading something they shouldn't have, in their right mind, even THOUGHT to look at...

Now, I don't find the psychotropic IC to be overkill in the slightest. Except I would have made the suggesting to be something more like instilling increasing paranoia against his teammates, and the idea that Aztech is the only one he can really trust.

And yeah... I can't really imagine the runners surviving long after they pulled something like that off. Really can't. Aztechnology just has to many resources to throw against them.

Meh, this is some arbitrary form of GM punishment when he made a mistake but blames the players for it. And sanity systems is nothing I want to see in SR, it already ruined CoC for me. But that is a different topic. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Yeah, well... Just go for the psychotropic IC Doc.
That player is seriously lacking some shadowrun-paranoia...

Well I gotta give them an out, the game I play is pretty chrome at times and this is one of those times. I get to kill on of my players for dramatic effect (he's going on vacation and when he comes back he's going to make a new character) and these are new players who lack... understanding.

And like I said in another post, it gives me an excuse to move my campaign to somewhere else /and/ teach a lesson about the difference between being greedy, and being stupid.

I think I need to print out a sign that reads "I will not consume a power source, no matter how tempting, larger than my own head". and pin that to his character sheet.

Plus, from a purely meta gaming standpoint. I hate killing a whole team because the RL newbie jacks up the run (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) . Realistic yes, breeds some game table drama... probably.

@ Zak - so if I take my stock of the line drone and hack into a zero point facility I should just be able to snatch any pay data I want?

No. Doc made a good call, and our GM pulled something like this when our hacker failed to get a good stealth roll (why oh why didn't he burn edge w/ 1 success.) He thought he got lucky but the system basically dumped him on a fake node that said he had been granted higher access, while the drones started tracking us down w/ the he-grenades of pain stuffed inside of them. No I really agree that you get nothing. Now if there was a run to get this kind of data it would have been a better fit, and personally I feel that there was either a crazy high rank data bomb dropped onto his comlink, or a virus that will transmit the team's coordinates. In the Shadowrun world if someone pulls a bush league stunt like that and his character doesn't wind up dead then I would feel that it doesn't actually fit with the SR universe itself. I mean it would be like....

1. character jacks on the net
2. the virus broadcasts his coordinates to Azzi
3. Two minutes later a specter gunship with movement 10 and basically invisible on the astral creates a large smoking crater where the runner used to be.

Sorry but you can't blame a GM for keeping with "um... yeah so you get hit by the hammer because that was just really fing stupid."