Run idea: Advice requested., My players: you know the drill. Options

[ShadowDragon8685]

So, I was grasping at straws for a 'Run I could throw my players on, and a friend of mine gave me an idea:

A hospital in the Barrens needs supplies critically, hostile gangs have hijacked entire shipments three times running, and they're basically out. They don't have enough money to just airlift the supplies, so they need a good-guy group that can arrange heavily-armed transport for the goods.

My group currently have an Ares CityMaster, and an Ares Roadmaster, so... They definitely have the "heavily-armed transport" thing down pat.


Basically, the idea is that they would transport the goods, fight off a few light attacks from the hostile gang, and then deliver the goods. But while the goods are being delivered, an unpleasant surprise arrives: the hostile gang has goaded an entire ghoul nest into besieging the hospital, thus putting them all in a bind, and forcing them to defend a hospital in the Barrens until the cavalry shows up to run off the horde.


In this case, I figure the hostile gang should be the Spikes (since I've made them the "pitch black" part of the black and gray morality going down in Puyallup,) and the hospital that needs supplies is the one in Tarislar. They'd rather hire Runners than ask the Ancients for help because, well, the civilian populace of Tarislar are said in Seattle 2072 to be sick and tired of all the gangs, even the ones that nominally formed to protect them back in the day. Might have something to do with the fact that better than half of the junkies who find their way to the hospital are tweaking and jonesing for Ancients product.


So, my players are hired to provide escorts for a rigger's big-rig carrying the supplies; they'll fight off a few half-hearted attacks on the way in, and start to unload, then the hell shows up. The Rigger they were hired to escort disconnects his tractor from the trailer and does a legger, leaving them desperately trying to fortify a hospital against ghoul attacks.

I reckon it needs to be troublesome, though; not only would the ghouls attack, but they might have a few magicians in their ranks who summon possession spirits. So that ghoul you just shot down might rise again, as a possessed corpse.


So, they'll need to hold out until the Cavalry - in this case, Ancients, led by a Contact of theirs - show up in force to drive off the ghouls. But there's some worries I'm having as a GM that just makes me think it might be simpler to go with a more conventional run.

For instance, they'll have access to some heavy firepower, and probably bring it along on a run like this. There need to be hostiles big enough and bad enough to justify their heavy gear (such as a rocket launcher, three gun-armed rotodrones and two gun-armed land-drones, in addition to the trucks,) but I'm at a loss as to what might comprise such, short of metahumans in armored vehicles.

And, if they unleash the rotor-drones, the horde would pretty much get mowed down, unless they're like, Helms Deep numerous. What, if any, shortcuts are good for handling such situations, beyond just straight fiat?

Is there anything I could use for this kind of stuff that isn't ghouls or bugs? HMHVV is pretty much a character breaker, and Bug Spirits are something you just don't want to deal with.

What would there be for the hacker to do, besides taking control of some of the spare drones?



And lastly, any other thoughts on the idea? Am I mad to even consider it?