Un-Shadow-ee Players, Warning: Long Options

[Monnock]

Hello, I'm new here (really new, I just found your forum) and I'm new to the Shadowrun system... and setting... Ok, I'm really new.

Now that that's out of the way, here is my question: My players refuse to work in the shadows! Just last mission, they were tasked with getting something from a truck that was delivering its cargo to a depot where it would be loaded onto a bullet train. They had no idea what the cargo was, though I don't think that played much of a part in their plan.

Their first idea was to blow the train off the tracks... Thank goodness they didn't go through with that, though perhaps that would have been more subtle than what they ended up doing.

The truck was being escorted by two KE police cars (very low security considering the cargo, but the idea was to keep a low profile and reinforcements were on standby). The party took a hummer, armored it up, mounted a light machine gun (Ingram White Knight equivalent) on it (it fipped up so it wasn't obvious) and loaded it up with explosive rounds and attacked it. The funny thing was, the LMG was used to just blow out the tires. The party technomancer hacked the two patrol cars running one of them into oncomming traffic and putting the other in reverse so it crashed into one of the cars that had just returned to the road after the chase had passed them. The mage killed the guard in the passanger seat with a mana-bolt for no reason.

Well, they managed to stop the truck and got the cargo. Through some good driving, they managed to escape the vehicle with all the KE police in the area chasing after them, and the driver managed to get the car away by driving it into the Rox (crime hotspot of Boston) where they didn't pursue because things had been quiet and they didn't want to be lead into an ambush.

At least they got away without anyone knowing who they were... Only problem was they got too greedy. Two people were offering them the same job, each from a different fixer. They gave the package to their first Johnson because he offered more, then sold him out to the other Johnson. The other Johnson was sent by the corp that they were stealing from once they caught word that information about the shipment was out there, and they had hoped to cover their hind-quarters by hiring their own Runners to get the package for them. It was deemed cheaper to hire them to steal the package (which they could cover the cost of with the security breach compensation that the KE offered) than to hire them to escort, which could lead to problems of its own (like them stealing the package for themselves anyways).

So here is the situation, by the next day the Johnson they gave the package to has been arrested and, of course, after being betrayed rats the runners and the fixer that set him up with them out.

KE was massivly embarrased by this incident, as a vehicle with military grade weaponary (that only shot out the tires, but the media loves leaving that out) just attacked and escaped into the Rox; Lonestar is capitolizing on this by publishing adds that are along the lines of "Lonestar wouldn't let this happen to you" and promising to clean up the Rox (though of course this is just propoganda, Lonestar is no where near equiped to handle such an invasion). It is unlikely that Lonestar could wrest the contract from Boston due to intanglements the government has with KE, but the possibility still exist, and it could prove costly to KE if it happens. They have a huge inscentive to regain popular support by bringing these guys in.

Ok, I'm really sorry for the LONG post, but the reason why I put it all out there was because this happens all the time with my players, not just in this system. They never seem to 'care' about the reprecussions of their actions, which tends to get them into a LOT of trouble since they love to abuse their power. To me it seems obvious that ratting out the guy who gave you work is just bad business, am I wrong? Attacking KE with military grade weaponary, hacking their patrol cars to kill innocent bystanders, and (to add insult to injury) they have magic too that they didn't even use other than to kill some guy who wasn't even a threat to them seems like it would draw a HUGE responce from KE, or would they really not care as much (would the public care that this happened?) It's getting to the point where I feel like I need to give them 'Deliver this teddy bear to a little girl" missions just so they don't go psycho and get themselves arrested or killed, but I also want to make sure that I'm not blowing things out of proportions.

I want to run a game that is more complex than just a simple 'gun them all down' game, and honestly so do my players, but they just don't think at all about their actions. Any ideas how I can get this through to them? I feel like saying something like "stay in the shadows" wont be enough, since I already prefaced this setting with that. The mage is already talking about commiting small-scale genocide of Force 1 spirits to fuel his spells (I have no idea why he wants to spend all that :nuyen: on that), I guess he doesn't think that the spirits will ever care about it or retaliate in some way in the future.

My plan is to have them set up by there fixer to go on a run to a wearhouse where a S.W.A.T. team is on standby to capture them using non-leathal force (unless absolutly nessisary, though they shouldn't need to since they are using gel ammunition). Once captured a 'mysterious benifactor' will help them bail out under the condition that they get the Johnson out too. Not sure where I will go exactly after that, but I'm hoping that this will send the message. I'm also not sure what to do if they manage to escape the capture.

Meh, ok, I'm done. What do you guys think? Am I wrong about this whole situation? I can't help but feel like I'm being a 'bad guy' here by throwing the consequences at them when they are just having fun. Sorry for the rediculously long posting, I'm just a bit overwhelmed.