Did we mess up? Options

[Jtuxyan]

Our runner group consists of a technomage, a cybered up troll thug, an elven infiltrator, an ork mage, and a bunkered rigger (me!). For the first part of this run, our mission is to steal a commlink from some ork pop-star during a concert in the badlands, with that orks old gang running security.

The DM tells us right off there are over 1000 heavily armed fans in attendance, plus security, plus four drones buzzing around, and he'll outright say were butchered if we try to fight our way through that.

So we start to argue about a plan, and after 20min of OOC chat, the DM yells that an hour has passed IC and we have to get our butts in gear or the concert will end. I try to sneak in, but the DM tells me that the odds of a drone getting in as a guest are between zero and none, and that haveing a drone smash through the wall would be a bad idea. The rest of the party is having about as much luck.

Frustrated, I OMWTF the rigger running the drones in cybercombat and steal them. The DM says he immediately sets off an alarm, security panics, and a fight breaks out amongst the ork fans.

In the confusion, the mage and infiltrator manage to get in, steal the commlink, and get out.

In a technical sense, the mission was a smashing success, we got what we wanted, were not ID'ed by security, and got a nice bonus from hawking the drones.

But, we fought amongst ourselves, essentially acting as individuals. We say that's because the DM rushed us, and we didn't have time to plan. The DM says it's because we suck.

There's another issue as well. The way we see it, all they know is that some punk hacker knocked out their (fairly pathetic) rigger, and in the insuing riot, a few drones and personal effects went missing. The GM says that they'll know it was a shadowrunner team.

So, what's the conclusion? Did we do good, and the GM was stacking the deck? Or do we need to work harder as a group?

[DireRadiant]

Well, despite everything, did you have fun?

[deek]

Two main things that I can see...

1) Your GM doesn't seems flexible and wants your team to accomplish the mission in a "certain" way. The "right" way, which unfortunately, is the way he wants you to do it...I don't think he stacked the deck against your team, but he did give you a scenario that would force your team to think outside the box. I don't like the fact that he basically told you things that wouldn't work right off the bat...the things you suggested, probably wouldn't work, but they are based on some rolls, so while your drone may not have snuck into the show, the drone wouldn't have automatically alerted anyone that a team was on the prowl.

2) It sounds like your team needs some more time working together. But, that is how all teams operate at first, until you have a track record of how you get things done. I think it was good that the GM rushed you along, but only to a point. If you only spent 20 minutes talking OOC, he shouldn't have made a whole hour pass in game time.

To me, the run was a success, both because you got the comm (which was your objective) and second, because you learned to plan on the fly. Hopefully, the next run, you will not have so much OOC arguing or the GM rushing you.

As to whether you are found out or not as a shadowrunning team, its not huge...yet:) The GM can spin that multiple ways, but I would say its a good idea to plan out a little more and think of ways to not be seen...

But, the end result, you met your objective and if you all had fun, I'd say it was a success. I do worry about the GM, as he seems (from your description) that he is not very flexible and may not know all the rules...he wants to see everything done "his" way or else make things fail.

I'd let you try whatever you want, as a GM, and just describe the sceanrio as it happens. Just because a run fails, doesn't mean the session failed...it just means you have some answering to do and you might take a hit on reputation!

[Abbandon]

Why didnt the orc guy buy a ticket goto the concert get his orc buddies that were runnign security to let him have access to the comm and then ecape.....

It sounds like the GM was being to anal and only wanted things to go one way but it also sounds like maybe the group were just tossing out insane plans.

I bet that concert had like 5 million camera's set up all over the place. I'd say its safe to say that anyone who watches the playbacks could spot the people not fighting and sneaking around during all the chaos. Mix in a 3rd guy that is a hacker and you have a small team of people taking stuff.........

lol the GM probably had an anuerism(sp?). I guess the only way tomove forward is just keep it simple. You guys feel he was being to anal and you ackowledge that you werent working that well together or coming up with a sensable plan.

Hacking drones?? Thats like anti stealthy. It would trigger a full lockdown and your lucky you accomplished your objectives.

[2bit]

[Ravor]

[TheMadDutchman]

It can sometimes take a couple of runs to really polish off an M.O. for a team. Personally, I think saying "they know a shadowrunner did it" is like saying "they know it was done" sure, who else was going to steal his comm in the middle of a concert w/ that much security.

Realistically there should only be cameras to catch the skulker on video if the GM remembered to add them in when the run was being planned and those should have been taken into consideration when the difficulties for the stealth rolls were being determined.

Yes, it does sound like your GM wants you to do it his way and I'm not saying that closing off an option doesn't make a run more fun and challenging; but I'm also not a fan of stealing time from players. If you're sitting around real time arguing for 20 minutes how does an ingame hour go by? Do you characters speak at 1/3 your normal speed of speech? They shouldn't. Did you all buy the flaw "horrible stutter?" (not really a flaw in SR4; I know).

As a GM, sure if the players are sitting around arguing for 20 minutes I'll bring it to their attention, but stealing time like that; I just don't believe it should be done. If players argue for 20 minutes or half an hour; it's time to remind them that we're all there to have fun, or call a 10 minute break so that everyone can cool down.

In the end the only thing that should matter (win, lose, or draw) is whether or not you all (GM included) had fun.

[Backgammon]

[Rifleman]

As a long time GM and lurker, and also as someone who's been reading your GM's posts, I will only make two points:

1. Your GM is inexperienced by the sounds of it, but trying. So he did mess up a bit but give him some slack.

However, the whole they know it was a shadowrun team bit is logical (You average hacker doesn't go to the trouble of smashing up a Rigger 'just because', and the chaos screams distraction.)

Paranoid sounding? Welcome to corporate/street life of 2070. You'd think the same thing as a runner if you heard it on the news.

[Edit: added 'than that' and two commas for clarity]
BUT it is illogical, until they do an inventory, that they know anything more than that. They won't know who or what was the target, or if it was something meant to hit a member of the crowd or someone or even just ruin the event. Unless what you took was REALLLLLLLYYYY important.

2. You have personality conflicts within the group, and that is causing trouble as well because you are acting as individuals rather than a team.

However, I have to wonder about some things: If your trying to sneak in with a drone, is it a steel lynx or is it a insect sized flier? Were you overstepping your characters abilities? That comes into play too, because if players feel like they are being pushed out by others trying to become an Uber-PC, they will object on principle.

Okay, three points.

3. Your the bunkered Rigger. This means that you are far away, but also limited to what you can do. Hacking a drone, (Unless your good) has a decent chance to set off an alarm if for no other reason than the GM has tricks too.


[Edit, making the subject of the Jamming clearer.]
You have to be prepared for the consequences, and being so far away caps your ability to do so. You can't just switch out your van contents on the fly, and heaven help you if someone jams the signal between you and your van and physically breaks into the van. If they do that, they have your gear and your livelihood, and most likely have a couple hints to where a overactive couch potato with a ton of goodies.

Or if lonestar tries to pull over your van... that could be ugly. Especially if you unload drones on the cops and they in turn call in air support.

Or if you get hacked and locked out of your system.

Do I sound mean and evil considering these things? Yes, but as a GM if it's easy, then it is not really fun or challenging. Also, A flaw is only a flaw if it does something. If he let you have a bunker, I would be worried as a player.

[Ryu]

It is not rare for our group to act on a spontaneous plan instead of the one that was hammered out in one real-time hour. Good ideas are often simple but late.

About the individuality, I as a GM would consider that a success. Efficient teamwork is something that has to be learned, and SR is weak for a squad-level combat game anyway. I´d even say that many times the OOC-discussions and consultations result in an efficiency that is only appropiate for trained military characters with top-notch communications gear (BattleTac), but often used by punks who could only afford a half-load of ammunition for their only gun.

[VivianDQ]

I was in this run, was the mage, and personally didn't really see any arguing among the players. We were just throwing out ideas trying to figure out how to do this for a bit and the GM was just trying to keep things moving. Everything went fine to me, I had fun since I spent a good chunk of that run just laughing.

I kept seeing things from the poor people who were in the room with the comlink when it all started going down. They were just sitting there when the security suddenly went on high, some shots rang out, then a giant cybered up troll runs into the room, grabs a commlink and just runs back out. I was laughing so hard I could barely type.

Was is disorginized, sure but what did you expect? This is shadowrun after all, you shouldn't really be expecting brilliant perfect plans from anyone. I don't know how many actual real life mercs and hitman play this game but I'm assuming its a low number. Just forget roleplaying for a moment and look at what an actual sr game basically is. Take two middle/high school kids, a burger king employee, a security guard at sears and a Jc penny manager. Give them superhuman abilities, incredibly advanced technology and magical abilities. Then point at a building and tell them to go in there and get something. Now is this going to go well? Probably not, but its going to be really fun to watch.

[Unarmed]

Nothing annoys me more than when the GM has a set idea in his/her head about how the team should complete a mission and then finds weak ways to foil the team if they try anything else. Sounds like your GM did a bit of that in this session, but in the end you guys did accomplish the mission, with perhaps a bit more fanfare than was necessary.

[sunnyside]

Sounds like things went fine. Especially if this was an early adventure. And no a stealth roll doesn't neccesarily negate all the cameras particularily when there are a lot of them, and more importantly when the stealth guy doesn't know where they are.

Though obviously they can reduce exposure.

And acting as indaviduals when things go wrong happens, and can be exciting and fun.

The thing I actually see that could be bad in all this is that it looks like some characters may have gotten sidelined. And that can be not so good if it happens a lot.

Of particular worry is the technomancer. As I understand it the OP is probably a solid hacker in their own right, and technomancers, while massivly powerful in the matrix in the hands of an experienced player, can fall flat in the hands of a novice, and the matrix is often minimized with new GMs.

This isn't their fault, they're new, and the matrix isn't well fleshed out in the rules. Heck we've got a bunch of experienced GMs here who bungle matrix stuff.

But the point is that between having someone else who can do the same things they can, a GM who may not include the matrix often (and may not have many systems potent enough to merit a TM), and most TMs being fairly pathetic in real life without their drones, there is a high chance the player may get sidelined.

[Jtuxyan]

[Rifleman]

[sunnyside]

On the technomancer thing. That does not bode well. Really as a GM I don't think I'd have a newbie play a TM. In my opinion they're more for the rigger/hacker who is ready to take it to the next level.

I've got a bad feeling Emergence will result in a bunch of newbs making characters they have no idea how to play.

Relecting on this more you guys really do overlap heavily. In practice a TM is actually very close to a bunker rigger/hacker. Due to the fact they tend to not have BP left over at chargen to put into physical abilities.

The primary differences are that her char, if used properly, is a much much better hacker. Super stealthy. This assumes she didn't screw the pooch at chargen. However if a GM lets a newb make a TM, and lets them make a piss poor one, and then won't let them rearange things under the hood after the first adventure or two, that's pretty vicious. At that point I may suggest the "unable to deal with the unending suffering of the world and societies reject of her, she jumps off the building" approach. But it kinda stinks to lose even a little karma.

Personally I would suggest that you kinda take her under your wing, IC mostly. You're a lonely old shut in, shes a vibrant young TM (most are).

This may take some letting go of any powergaming jealousy you may have. After a little tweaking under the hood, she'll be better with drones AND with hacking than you are. You characters advantages would have more to do with being able to repair and modify drones and being able to do a whole bunch of different things in the matrix without risking fading or using up services.

[JonathanC]

[Unarmed]

[Jtuxyan]

[sunnyside]

[JonathanC]

Everybody hates railroading. Everyone. GMs, at least in my experience, hate railroading too; it's done as a panicking manuever to avoid the game collapsing because the players are going into an area that the GM hasn't prepared for. I tend to err on the side of letting players wander off too far, and I've seen that approach fail too, as the group splits off into too many individual threads, and dealing with every person's action individually creates huge periods of "dead time" for everyone else.

Sadly, Game Mastering isn't a science, and it tends to work differently for every group. I'm overjoyed when I finally happen upon the right "formula" for running with a particular group.

In this situation, given that I know the exact adventure the GM was using, I'm more prone to chalk it up to inexperience and blame the adventure than the GM himself. The worst part of On The Run is that the "good part" of the adventure is completely optional for the players; if they make one particular, logical decision after receiving the MacGuffin, they miss out on the actual climax (this happened to my group).

[fistandantilus4....]

I'd say it's just a matter of a ne group trying to find it's footing. The GM could be a bit mroe felxible, but if he's new to it, that's common. A lot of times, especailly when working off a premade module ,there's a tendency to want to stick to script, when running a game for the first time. It's tough enough trying to manage a group. Harder when they go away from what you have planned for. It jsut takes a while to get to be more nimble and adaptive with the game.

As for the team, well it's a group of new characters, and the new characters usually don't know each other on the first run. Same for new players; they don't know their characters yet. Takes time to get in the groove. I do think that the bunkered rigger makes things a bit more difficult on the team. All it takes is some good jamming and he's out of the show, leaving them high and dry, where if he were there physically, he can always pick up a gun. As a character/PC, I'd be pretty upset if one of our team wasn't out there taking the same risks we were, and using potentially high profile drones that can draw attention to us. But that's just me.

In general though, just be more aware of the group dynamics. On the other side of the screen, you have to be able to improvise as a GM. Takes some getting used to, so good luck. :)

[ShadowDragon8685]

I'm the DM, and this is sounding like a Shadowrunner's Anonymous Meeting.

Just so everyone's on the same page, this was Nabo's concert, from On the Run. There were four cameras in attendance - four MCT Fly-Eyes in the skies, two outside the warehouse, two inside.


As for the options, the only one I told them would flat-out FAIL is if they tried to physically shoot their way through the entire crowd, security, and all and butcher everyone up to and including Nabo in order to steal the commlink.

I flat-out told them that if they tried an idea that monolithically insane, I would just tell them they get cut down in a hail of massed gunfire.

As for their other plans... He didn't exactly win a mighty victory over a corp hacker, here. He pulled the matrix equavilent of 'jacking him up on the cyberjohn - he hacked into the trailor, which was essentially unsecured since it was only set up for like 6 hours, and the sec-rigger was hot rigging one of his drones. He was essentially flatfooted, and the hacker pulled out a high rating attack program, nearly downed him in one shot, then won cybercombat initiative and finished him off before the guy got to react, thus dumpshocking him.

Dumpshocking does not render someone unconcious, unless it does enough to exceed their stun track - since he was hot rigging, it did physical damage, but not enough to exceed his physical track.

So he did what any idiot would do, he hit the panicbutton and reported what had happened. Had this been a corporate secured zone, gun turrets would have popped up, the concert would have been called, and Nabo smacked over the head and bundled into a waiting escape chopper before you could say "Dumbass".

As the security was being managed by Jager and Nabo's gang from the barrens, frankly, they didn't know what to do when they get the report that the security hacker's been compromise and his drones potentially taken over. Nabo, of course, simply went on with the concert, trying to keep everyone calm.


Then, I literally outlaid the options presented in the book to the players, because frankly, they're smart enough to figure that out. I told them they could just waylay someone in the porta-john and grab his "re-entry" wristband.

Instead, they opted to go for unconventional entry, which was cool. So I let them climb to the roof, the mage and the stealth guy, while the troll sits around the back of the warehouse by the zip-line, looking intimidating and smart.

So, the mage throws invis on the stealth guy, who climbs down the walls and sneaks backstage with like seven or eight hits on an insane infiltration test. So his invis wears off backstage, but... Hey, I completely forgot the orc who was supposed to be in the rocking chair. Oh well, he was in and out in under twenty seconds. So he runs up the stairs, into the dressing room, sees the three orcs getting busy. Rolls fourteen hits on a Perception test. On a threshold one. :P

Resisting the temptation to tell him he percieves the Astral, I describe everything in the room - he sees the ork's gun in his jacket, sees the fight breaking out downstairs through the crack in the curtain, sees Nabo's commlink. He grabs the commlink and runs out.

This was fast. Really fast. So I said that the ork on the couch barely has time to raise an objection (which is quickly quashed by what one of his lady friends does to him), and down below, the trolls guarding backstage are busy trying to get the crowd under control.

The mage tosses invisibility on him, he climbs back up, and the group makes good their get-away, and they go to celebrate by cracking Nabo's commlink over ice cream.


I was trying to keep things moving, since the adventure specifically calls for me to put the pressure of time on them. I wasen't trying to railroad them into "my way or the highway", just to do something reasonable. Bringing a toy drone shaped like a griffon with glittering holographic wings and other features, into a raving concert in the barrens...

If it somehow got through the door, and somehow managed NOT to get stepped on by a troll, it would've been very rapidly disassembled for money, because it was inlaid with precious metals and such. Either way, I think brazenly attacking the sec hacker screamed "Shadowrunners!", and I'm pretty sure Horizon (Nabo's corporate backers) know it was Shadowrunners who did it.

The question is, do they know enough about who, and do they care enough? Well... That, my players will find out later. :)

[fistandantilus4....]

[JonathanC]

Again, I sympathize with you, as I ran this same scenario last month with my players. It went alright in my case. I'm wondering why the mage didn't keep sustaining the Invis spell the first time instead of letting it wear off.

Anyway, the scenario you had sounds alright, though that Sec Rigger must have been crazy to hot rig like that, especially if he hadn't secured the joint. Getting past the Firewall on a rigger's commlink should be a herculean task, since that's their bread and butter in terms of keeping other people away from their drones. Likewise, if you're running security surveillance drones, you'd probably be keeping them in AR windows so you could get the big picture. If I was a rigger with big corp money to buy decent autosofts, I'd never jump into a drone. I'd point out my enemies like the Wicked Witch and say "get them my pretties!" and laugh my ass off while they got the sweet buck-buck.