Learning Lessons the HARD Way., -or- Yes, I AM an evil GM!! Options

[MadDogMaddux]

Buddy came over tonight to play some SR4. I started a campaign with him and another friend to sort of teach myself the SR4 system, and it's just sort of evolved as an on-the-fly game. The one guy has only ever made it once, but my main player (who's character is Jace - a semi-street-sami with high essence cuz he uses bioware) has played a few times.

Last time we played he had this really annoying dog to kidnap and deliver, and we quit right after he made the delivery at about 8PM in the Tacoma warehouse district.


So we start up and I ask him what he does when he leaves.


He decides to WALK through Tacoma looking for an eatery.


ALONE.


At NIGHT.


(Now, he's finally just bought the SR4 book and before we started tonight he was telling me insights gleaned from reading it thus far. One insight is that he needs to get more into the criminal mindset to play in this universe properly.)

So I thought about telling him that was a bad idea, but instead decided to let him make an Intuition roll to see if his character could figure that out.

He glitched.

So I let him walk a bit, turn a corner and have him roll a Perception roll.

He failed.

Failed a second time.

And failed his Surprise roll (critical glitch!)


And so out of the shadows come 6 low level gangers. Basically using the SR4 Halloweener template. Lieutenant hits him with a molotov cocktail, 3 of the gangers charge him with lead pipes, and the other two shoot him with Streetline Specials.

Now Jace has a NICE lined jacket with fire resistance, and has a Platelet Factory and Pain Tolerance 2. So he weathers it decently. Still takes 3 Physical damage from the molotov, but also takes a BUTTLOAD of stun damage from all the attackers. He whips out his Katana and tries to fight back, but rolls crappy and can't score a hit.

So he tries to run, successfully disengages from melee, and tries to duck behind a corner.

But the gangers chase him, shoot him, and knock him out with stun damage.


Well the next thing is logical. I roll 1d6 to determine how many hours it takes him to wake up. He heals off most of his stun damage while sleeping for 5 hours, wakes up at 3 AM to find himself in the same place, just a little.......lighter.

Items missing:

Katana
Colt Manhunter
Mossburg AM CMDT
Lined Coat (Fire resistant 4)
5 smoke grenades
5 thermal smoke grenades
Auto Picker
Respirator
Maglock Passkey
Maglock Sequencer
Backpack
Novatech Navi Commlink.

I let him keep some stim patches, a boot knife, and his glasses, which are augmented.


He wakes up, realizes that traveling at this time of night in these conditions could be bad, so finds a box, crawls in, and sleeps till sunrise. Gets up finds a nearby thoroughfare, and manages to get a cabbie to actually take him home.


Well, I was nice and let his Hacker Brother find his commlink for sale on the Matrix, but it cost him about 400 nuyen more than he had left, so he had to owe his brother that at first.

Then he managed to bum a Streetline Special and a ratty nasty pair of armored clothes (4/0) off of his beat-cop buddy (war buddies).


And now?


Well now, he's reduced to staking out seedy bars, waiting to mug their patrons as they stagger out after a night of drinking, in hopes of finding enough sellable items and credsticks to begin saving up to purchase some decent equipment.


LOL. (or maybe MUWAHAHAHAHAH!)


On the positive side, at least now he's really being challenged, and even said, "well, you've made this game a LOT more interesting now...."

[Cold-Dragon]

XD

I like how he's taking this pretty well too. Not everyone tolerates getting mugged (of all things) in game. ;)

[Demerzel]

All those valuable body parts and 5 hours of unconciousness and those gangers didn't sell the most valuable parts and leave the rest for ghoul sandwitches?

[de4dmeta1]

I guess the thought didn't occur to them. Probably more thinking "This guy's packing some heavy heat, better grab it before his buddies show up"

[Narmio]

Heh.

This is why runners work in teams. Although I'm surprised a half-dozen gangbangers didn't spot his Mossberg and react somehow (probably by getting friends and confronting the heavily armed stranger). It's a full-sized combat shotgun, 'tis hard to hide.

I guess that's why they hit him hard and fast, then. Didn't want him to get a chance to draw on them. Might be something you want your players to keep in mind in future, packing heat in Tacoma is expected, but brazenly carrying assault weapons and a sword...

[zero skill LPB]

Sounds like you've introduced your player to a great opportunity -- the fun of working his way out of the lean times of a famine.

Just don't forget that players also like to gorge themselves on a feast every once in a great while. :-)

[MadDogMaddux]

Well, the problem with letting him get organ-legged or ghoul eaten is that then he has to make a new character, and he JUST is getting into it..... :P


And yeah, I'm hopeful that lessons will be learned, and fun will be had re-earning all the goodies.

[Garrowolf]

If the guy has a fixer then why doesn't he go and ask for a job doing some bouncing or bodyguard work, get an advance and equip again?

Or is this a street level game?

What about his contacts? They will do favors usually. He could get reequipted and pay them back out.

[MadDogMaddux]

Heh. He sort of failed to take a Fixer contact.

I gave him a job through his Beat Cop buddy, that was the job he was just finishing. He could probably get a job as a bouncer or something, but has no gear at all. *shrug*

[knasser]

He's taken it all extremely well. The player must be some sort of Zen type person.

Still, I look forward to the day he's upgraded, re-equipped and he's walking through Tacoma and the same guys try to mug him. :D

[Ryu]

Props to the gangers that managed to walk away after an encounter with a samurai. Why he choose to fight with the katana is beyond me. Running is the best self defense, especially if you can run much faster and turn around with a combat shotgun at the ready.

He should likely not turn to mugging but to breaking and entering (depending on his skill set of course). Or he could go to a red light district and offer to be muscle for the syndicate.

[Thanee]

[BishopMcQ]

True, but it's always my hope that when I pull the same trick on a player, they have prepared, planned, and know how to deal with the threat.

And if the dice are with him this time, he will probably stand up as a decent threat to the gangers...

[2bit]

thats awesome maddux. you guys are going to have a fantastic campaign.

[eidolon]

Sounds cool. Good scene.

[MadDogMaddux]

Well, I think the reason he pulled out his Katana is because he was already in melee and would have penalties for a firearm. And as far as running faster - he didn't take anything to let him run FASTER, just to give him more initiative passes, etc.

And all his B&E gear got stolen, so none of that for him just now :P


I do wonder, though, why he didn't fall back and pull out the Shottie. But I've been trying to take it away from him for a while now, so I'm sorta glad he didn't. :P

[kzt]

[Mistwalker]

I think because he was in melee with 3 gangers, while 2 others were hanging back shooting at him.

Thought, I do hope that they had dice pool penalties for firing into melee (or partial cover, what ever works for you).

[Phantom Runner]

[MadDogMaddux]

There is a -3 dice pool modifier for the attacker firing while in Melee Combat.

The ones who shot him were NOT in melee combat.

*Shrugs* I woulda whipped out the Shottie, myself - but he didn't.

[Mistwalker]

Or to make sure that the next group that has the opportunity to do something like that, kills you, rather than leaving you alive.

[Mistwalker]

[2bit]

shoot then charge. how hard is that... :please: they even got surprise on him!

[X-Kalibur]

[Mistwalker]

Sorry, not meaning to argue with anyone.
MadDogMaddux stated earlier that he was new to GMing SR4, and seemed to be asking for advice, opinions, etc...
I was offering up a suggestion to make firing into melee a little more realistic, and while still following RAW (or at least my interpretation of it).