suggestions for subterfuge - Dumpshock Forums

suggestions for subterfuge

Jimmy_the_Fixer View Member Profile	Nov 23 2003, 06:25 PM Post #1
Target Group: Members Posts: 19 Joined: 11-July 03 Member No.: 4,903	alright, I have a campaign going where the runners have done some missions for the mafia, against the yakuza, and a few of them are now trying to hunt triads for a fight that ensued after an incident involving a few gas tanks and a timed explosive. right now they don't much nuyen to burn, but they have some pretty nice gear and a couple of goods contacts. there main income is the organ and cyberware smuggling. :nuyen: we've got a troll street sam, a night one ninja (who has done little to nothing, and will be forced to kill another PC), a mentally deranged adept (who is a rogue ninja) a human street sam (who has also done little to nothing) a dwarf street sam who beats people with a stick , and a sorceror who is a complete idiot. I need a few missions ideas for them, preferably some that involve a little double-cross, subterfuge, and maybe evan a little political intrigue :smokin:

Backgammon View Member Profile	Nov 23 2003, 10:36 PM Post #2
Ain Soph Aur Group: Dumpshocked Posts: 3,477 Joined: 26-February 02 From: Montreal, Canada Member No.: 600	These guys don't sound like the type of people I would hire to do something compliacted...

Tanka View Member Profile	Nov 23 2003, 10:42 PM Post #3
Chrome to the Core Group: Dumpshocked Posts: 3,152 Joined: 14-October 03 From: ::1 Member No.: 5,715	Looks like a fun night of swearing and arguing! :D

Digital Heroin View Member Profile	Nov 23 2003, 11:52 PM Post #4
Neophyte Runner Group: Members Posts: 2,458 Joined: 22-March 03 From: I am a figment of my own imagination. Member No.: 4,302	Actually, unless the run was meant to fail, I wouldn't hire them at all... With that in mind, send them on a sabotauge mission, they'll be keen on that... but have it as a set up, a distraction for a more professional team to do something... they fail but still get paid. Let them figure out why...

Herald of Verjig... Herald of Verjigorm View Member Profile	Nov 24 2003, 04:45 AM Post #5
Runner Group: Members Posts: 3,066 Joined: 5-February 03 Member No.: 4,017	As Heroin's except that on the off chance that they prevent direct survailance (not likely), the sabatoge targets still conclude that they are responsible for everything that happened that night.

Zazen View Member Profile	Nov 24 2003, 05:23 AM Post #6
Shooting Target Group: Members Posts: 1,685 Joined: 17-August 02 Member No.: 3,123	Yeah, you can hire them for surveillance jobs as an unwitting "open shadow". An open shadow is a tail that is meant to be noticed and ditched. The mark gets a false sense that they're no longer being watched, allowing the real team to get useful information. I read a Raymond Chandler novel that started out like that.

Eindrachen

Nov 24 2003, 12:52 PM

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QUOTE (Jimmy_the_Fixer)

alright, I have a campaign going where the runners have done some missions for the mafia, against the yakuza, and a few of them are now trying to hunt triads for a fight that ensued after an incident involving a few gas tanks and a timed explosive.

right now they don't much nuyen to burn, but they have some pretty nice gear and a couple of goods contacts. there main income is the organ and cyberware smuggling. :nuyen:

we've got a troll street sam, a night one ninja (who has done little to nothing, and will be forced to kill another PC), a mentally deranged adept (who is a rogue ninja)
a human street sam (who has also done little to nothing) a dwarf street sam who beats people with a stick , and a sorceror who is a complete idiot.

I need a few missions ideas for them, preferably some that involve a little double-cross, subterfuge, and maybe evan a little political intrigue :smokin:

Wow. This situation is way messed up.

First, if they plan to rumble with Yaks AND Triads, they better find more money than organ-legging and whatnot is going to get them. Yes, they need actual shadowruns.

Now, the make-up of your group is pretty freaking ridiculous. Your sammies are actually okay; the dwarf sammy may seem stupid, but cybermonkies don't have to be Einsteins, they just have to hit (AND shoot) good, and be able to take some damage on the chin. I've played plenty of them in other GMs' games, and I certainly don't try to be any smarter than needs be (unless everyone else is being stupid, of course).

TWO ninjas?! Why are there two of them? And no magician, aspected or otherwise, should last long in the biz if they are stupid. Neither do the insane, for that matter.

Okay, you asked for mission ideas. I'll get off the soapbox and give you one, but you may not like it.

First, have the Yaks approach the Night One ninja, and make a deal: he lives if he kills two PCs, and takes all the money the group has. Not long after that, leak word to one of the other PCs (through appropriate contacts, naturally) that the Yaks have convinced one of the group to betray them all.

While the dust is still kicking up from that one, have the Triads make a REAL attempt to turn the PCs into compost. I'm not talking about a retard with a palm pistol. I'd recommend three wired-up hitters with some big boomsticks, an adept or two with an extra Power Point or two each, and a full magician with about two to three spirits on tap.

Make it go down in a tall building the PCs are or can be gathered at; make it a condemned building with nothing close enough to try and jump to, should they think of that. Just for kicks, have the Triad hitters do a two-pronged attack: two sammies and the adept come in from the bottom floor, the magician (with spirits) and a sammy on the roof coming down. Have them meet the top folks first; if they defeat them soundly, have the bottom folks set a fire and wait outside. (If the PCs are stupid enough to stay inside, the building collapses into fiery rubble, and they all make new PCs.)

Throw in a rigger in a chopper (maybe the one who dropped off the top folks) occasionally spotting the PCs and spraying them with bullets (and an occasional missile), and the PCs are in for a hellishly good time.

If they survive, let them take a breath.

Let the Mafia contact them, and inform them that they can no longer closely associate with the PCs; it would strain relations with both the Yaks and the Triads, and no mob boss with a shred of sanity wants to fight two of the biggest syndicates on that side of the world at once. PC contacts still provide info and some help, but ask that they not stay around them too long or anything; they don't want to die, either.

If any PCs die, you should STRONGLY recommend they start to diversify the group. A full magician or two of some kind, and a rigger (who can deck some, maybe), would nicely round out the group.

The PCs are basically marked for death, and will have to run agains the Triads. They could also get money this way; some folks would gladly fund any movements made against the Triads. Have the PCs do raids on Triad fronts and establishments; hijack goods the Triads are smuggling; steal anything and everything that the Triads own.

During this, they could take special care to do anything that also simultaneously helps the Yaks. If they do enough, and carefully (i.e., respectfully) communicate with the Yaks, they may even find some work to do for them that would put them back in their good graces (and earn even more money).

If they do win back the favor of the Yaks, the Triads ask for peace. You could rationalize it any number of ways; just say that, for example, the local Triad big-wig was offed, because he tried to mess with the PCs, and now his blunder is hurting business, which is bad. They can make the PCs whatever offer seems considerate of their success and style.

That's all I can think of. There's angles and hooks to work out, but that should certainly get them back into shape, doing what shadowrunners do best: making money at someone's expense...

Jimmy_the_Fixer View Member Profile	Nov 27 2003, 05:17 AM Post #8
Target Group: Members Posts: 19 Joined: 11-July 03 Member No.: 4,903	yes the group is messed up, I admit that. the mage was introduced, but then left for awhile (the player has missed a few sessions) the crazy adept never leaves anything alive, and is being protected by the mob and has a chop shop docter fencing for him and acting as a pseudo fixer. so he has a decent amount of protection. the two ninja thing I don't think is so much of a big deal as long as you come down really hard on playing out of charicter, and fully enforce the flaws that come with it, for example, the adept is a rogue ninja, and is constantly looking over his shoulder, and always making sure no one can find traces of him (useually through explosivs). but sometimes he messes up jobs by just going around and killing stuff, they had a very time consuming missions with no pay because they owed them a favor for killing an important contact (they were only supossed to intimidate him, but made the mistake of leaving the adept alone with him while they dealy with some security.) and the other ninja hasn't been in it a lot, and is gone a lot due to the "day job" flaw that comes with being a legitimate ninja. he also is a decker, so he's not just a mindless slaughter machine, like the adept tends to be. neither of them know the other is a ninja, although the rogue one has his suspicions. the troll is actually a pretty solid voice of reason, but the dwarf is making a lot of enemys by being too straight forward, and also from his comeplete lack of etiquette. :S anyway, thank you for the input that really does help, and I agree that the group needs a lot more diversity

Crazy Elf View Member Profile	Nov 27 2003, 06:58 AM Post #9
Target Group: Members Posts: 40 Joined: 26-February 02 Member No.: 338	Um, for someone who doesn't like to leave a trace, explosives is not the right way to go about it. From an explosion you can guarantee certain things. First of all, Lone Star has most areas on drone surveillance, something blows up and they'll go over the area with a fine toothbrush looking for this person who keeps blowing things up, and they will find him. Explosions can be traced back to the type of explosive used, where they would have come from, how it was placed, and how it was detonated. And that's how is these days. In 2060 it's going to be a fuck load better than that. Blow shit up all the time, and you're toast. People that never leave anyone alive will have a contract out on their heads after the first run. If you kill a bunch of security guards then one of them will use the insurance as vengeance money. If you kill enough guards the corp will say, "These people are too dangerous to leave alone, put a contract on their heads yesterday." Bring the consequences for their lack of vision to the forefront. You should have enough for them to deal with on how much they've fucked up so far without bothering with runs that no one in their right mind would hire you to do. They're expendable at best.

Jimmy_the_Fixer View Member Profile	Nov 27 2003, 08:30 AM Post #10
Target Group: Members Posts: 19 Joined: 11-July 03 Member No.: 4,903	for the explosions he's been using something different almost everytime, and all the people he's killed are a bunch of street thugs, and john does. a few of them have been ordered, and have had enough cover to handle it. you do have a good point however. I should law down the law a little more, but in the past my players just refused to play with the amount of cops I threw at them (and the rate at which they got to the scene) for the large list of crimes that they commited. they would either refuse to play altogether when I gave them no leeway, that or they would constantly make new charicters in the middle of sessions to screw up my campaign, until I ran out of ideas and was forced to stop. useually I would just tell them to suck it in and keep playing, but this was the entire group (save one person). so yes, I should have them tracked down for these explosions, but it would only lead to one of the PCs (the crazy adept). the explosions would take care of a bunch of evidence, but creates more at the same time. but a lot of the contacts they had were used to clear out evidence for them (mainly because it would incriminate them as well) the "bombs" themselves were pretty crude, and were detonated differantly each time. you bring up a lot of good points, and some good ideas, I should be cracking down on them a lot more, but I'm not sure just how tough I should be. too much force and it seems like I'm just trying to kill PCs, too little and things get out of control (which I realize has happened), so my question is, how much law should I lay down? my players love this campaign, so I don't really want to scrap it, but I can't be too tough on my players.

Crazy Elf View Member Profile	Nov 27 2003, 11:36 AM Post #11
Target Group: Members Posts: 40 Joined: 26-February 02 Member No.: 338	Easy, this is how much force you need to lay down. Maximum force. As it stands your party is a bunch of psychotics who run about blowing things up and killing people. The law will crack down on that quickly and brutally. If they're killing criminals that criminal affiliates will crack down on them quickly and brutally. The thing is, cracking down on people doesn't mean that you're going to have to kill them all and let God sort them out. Lone Star is all about the arrests. It's looks good when they catch people, and put them to trial. Have authorities come down on them hard, put them in a situation they can't get out of (and if Lone Star is doing there job correctly, it should be just about any response they throw their way) and then have the police put them on missions they can't refuse. Make it clear that if they want to play, they're going to have to get smart about it. Show them what they're in for if they fuck up by pounding them to mush, without doing anything beyond what's already in the source material. Make them pay for it, and have the cops treat them like shit, and all the time you don't even have to kill them. You can be much nastier to the players without actually killing them, and after they go through all that, maybe they won't be so bloody stupid next time.

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