Building the Brickhouse, For DitG Players Options

[HeySparky]

I woulnd't focus on sat pics too much, since they're unlikely to be a good represenation of what's 'really' there. Because, let's face it, it's sprawl, not dense urban jungle. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Eyeless Blond]

Yes, well the sat pics show a few blocks of... trees. Trees and single family homes; a few middle class suburban cul-de-sacs.

Well, that's gonna have to go... (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

[Spike]

Redmond would not have become an abbandoned 'barrens' overnight. I know Puyallup supposedly did after the ghost dance, or something...

But there would have been a period of ghettoization (the opposite of gentrification?), where suburbanites moved out and massive tenements were built to house the increasing population of poor in the area. At least in Shadowrun's history. I think in the real world we've become increasingly unhappy with the idea of concentrating criminals and urban poor into massive distilleries of drugs and violence that will inevitably spread corruption throughout the community, and prefer to spread them out into easier to police smaller pockets, where you can at least pretend there is a chance to escape the crushing poverty, and where sheer masses of people don't breed horrific darwinistic...


... well, anyway: yeah, Suburban homes and trees could have been turned into the Brickyard any time in the next 30 years or so before the barrens REALLY became no man's land... The existing roads may be retained (if for no other reason that to prevent unnecessary changes to the street map...), the 'Yard' neighborhood quite probably was big enough to accomodate a minor network of transportation facilitiators (fancy gobbldy gook for 'roads'), even though it would have just been a relatively few (massive) buildings.

As I see it anyway...

[Eyeless Blond]

Oh yeah, 20 years of growth and possible urbanization, followed by the Crash should have many of those smaller communities rezoned for condos and apartment buildings, which will be re-rezoned to low income housing after the Crash destroys property values in the area.

It's just funny to see us talking in terms of old brick tenements, when you look at the map and see... trees, and a city park. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Dantic]

yes, talk to me about placing locations. DO NOT TOUCH THE MAPS. I don't care how "versed" you are in graphics programs.. DO NOT TOUCH THE MAPS (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES WHATSO FREAKING EVER SHOULD ANYONE OTHER THAN VEGAS, SPARKY, OR MYSELF TOUCH THE MAPS!

IN CASE YOU MISSED THAT, LET ME REPEAT, DO NOT TOUCH THE MAPS!!!

DO.

NOT.

TOUCH.

THE MAPS.

(Have I made myself clear yet? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif) )

*finger hovering over the mouse button* "I'm not touching them! I'm not touching them" (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

[Vegas]

*finger hovering over the mouse button* "I'm not touching them! I'm not touching them" (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

Don't make me recommend that terrible things happen to Twiggs (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

[Eyeless Blond]

Heh, like you'd need to recommend... (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

[Spike]

While I am out of the game I am willing to either polish up the Brickhouse Boys or withdraw completely from this creative effort.

In other words: Fat Charlie lives if you want, or Crowbar's theoretical 'survival' character sheet can be posted, along with an updated to reflect the characters history of the Boys.

Lemmee know which way to jump.

[Eyeless Blond]

Nah, let's stick with your idea. On further review, quirky and offbeat don't seem to fit this game that well, and honestly I like your idea better.

If you're willing to do the writeups I'd be glad of it; you're a terrific writer. If not I think I can finish up the descriptions, though I hope you'll at least stick around for consulting purposes. I'd hate to lose such a great source of ideas; Lord knows I have no talent when it comes to creativity, or writing, or any of that right-brained stuff. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Spike]

Sure. I'll pull it down and give it a couple of once-overs tonight, maybe post a newer version for review. I have a quick turnaround because I cheat.

I'll see if I can work in Dozer, Drip and Rico, and pull Maus back to the level of 'minor detail NPC', if not leave him out entirely. I'll leave the final review to those still in the game, along with the 'copy/paste' to the Wiki.


As for brain sides: I'm good at math and logic, my creativity is the result of following reasoning chains rather than stunning insights. Not sure that is better or worse, but there you have it. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

[Bearclaw]

Hey, Eyeless, would Drip consider "hacking" BTL's and downloads. Rather than trying to produce new stuff, I'll bet that with the right skills you can steal what's already out there for a much higher profit margin.

[Eyeless Blond]

Oh yeah, cracking stuff and copying it is fairly easy, if you have a decent Software skill. All we'd need to do is come up with a good Threshold for it.

[Spike]

Okay, I've only made a couple of tiny changes and added some more details here and there. I tried to toss Rico and Drip into the mix... along with namechecking the older BB characters, putting things into context.

I'm not sure any of it was improved, honestly, though I did give it a minor editorial overview so there should be fewer typos and grammatical errors... unintentional ones anyway.

[ Spoiler ]

For as long as anyone can remember there have been gangs in the old brick tenements in Kingsgate. Hundreds of families live there, poor, dispossessed... the local kids have always run in packs, played in packs, done petty crimes in packs; Just a fact of life in Kingsgate. Not that anyone would rightly call those packs of kids 'gangs', not properly. The real gangs of the area pretty much left the tenements alone, and used the various Brickhouse gangs as recruiting grounds, poaching the kids with the most potential, leaving the hangers-on to age up and out of the gangs.

The Crash didn't change too much. Not at first. A wave of newly SINless, many of them young adults, college students and dissaffected teenagers looking for an excuse migrated to the area and settled, naturally enough, into the relatively tame area of the Brickyard. They tended to group up together, and the younger kids began looking up to these 'more affluent' young men and their party-boy behavior. This was the start of the Brickhouse Boys.

Not that anyone in Kingsgate really cared. The new Boys were an older, larger version of the old Boys. Still unorganized, still committing petty crimes for petty reasons, and anyone with real talent or ability got snatched up and jumped into a real gang soon enough.

Crowbar was an old school Boy, having grown up in the Brickyard, in fact never setting foot outside of the tenement he was born in until he was 8. He'd never moved into real gangs, but his violent streak and tendency to steal cars (by means of the eponymous crowbar he carried for this purpose... breaking locking mechanisms by brute force) earned him his moniker and a reputation as a wild loner. When he was 12 he was picked up in Touristville after boosting a car some foolish SINner had driven to go slumming and spent the next 8 years in the Port Orchard Pit, getting out four years ago a hardened con.

Crowbar could have joined just about any Gang he wanted in Kingsgate, but he went back to the Yard, and linked up with the new incarnation of the Boys, bringing with him more criminal inclinations. Still, the other 'adults' in the gang considered him an outsider, a johnny come lately, and even, to an extent a wet blanket. He was good for scoring booze, often boosting it off of trucks, but not much else.

But Crowbar had some things they didn't have. He had ambition to be more than just another yardie thug, just another ganger. He also had a decent idea of how real gangs worked. He even had some real leadership ability, many of the younger Boys looked up to him.

The only thing he lacked, the only thing he'd ever lacked, was a good plan.

Taking over the boys was easy. He brought in some real criminals, real street gangers, some of whom, like Maus his pet enforcer, he'd met in prison. Others he recruited from other sources. His crew adopted the Peacoats to identify themselves within the Boys, and started doing 'real crime', shaking down the pimps, boosting cars for sale to chop shops, pushing BTLs and Drugs. It wasn't hard to recruit, the Brickhouse Boys party hard lifestyle was attractive to a lot of street gangers who thought the endless rumble was a waste of time.

Amazingly, there was no Schism. The previous Boys lacked real leadership, just degrees of influence over the seething mass of partygoers and boozehounds. The relatively organized and motivated Peacoats eventually became 'The Gang' while everyone else faded into 'hangers-on', and the Boys had 'arrived'. Two years to the day after stepping out of the Port Orchard Pen, Crowbar looked out over what he had wrought and thought it was good.

That was when they started really pushing themselves as a real gang. The tradition of not messing too much with the Brickhouse Boys held firm for a little while, but when Crowbar cracked down on poaching his members, it evaporated like so much smoke, and they became fair game to any other gang with a grudge. The Yard was still sacrosanct, a virtually untouchable fortress of brick and blood, but outside it’s protection the Boys learned to stick together, running in their signature packs almost to the exclusion of all else. Only the original peacoats, themselves veterans of the streets and prison system were bold enough to solo.

The first garage opened up soon after, and the Boys began rumbling, stealing cars and whatever else they could in roving packs, bringing them back to be stripped down for resale. It took another year before they started seeing enough profit to open the second chop shop. That was when they really earned the ire of the Asphalt Kings. Only after it opened did Crowbar start looking for dedicated mechanics to run the Chopshops. Some of the new blood, like Rico, were old street hands, true Peacoats, while others (Drip) were brought in for their technical abilities, even shielded from the harsher realities of gang life by the Packs.

It started small. The Kings were still growing into their role, but viewed all cars in Kingsgate as theirs. A few rumbles, a few streetfights and demo derbys were the name of the game at that point, the AK's heavily modified custom jobs against the Boys willingness to go steal an entire carlot just for that fight made for some interesting matchups. Nothing was resolved, and with some arrogance, the Brickhouse Boys thought they'd arrived, able to take on an older, more organized gang and win.

In reality, the Kings had other things to worry about than dealing with the BB's. Kingsgate was rapidly turning into a potential warzone between all the rival gangs in the area, and the Kings were playing things close to their chests.

It helped that the old brick tenements were, by Barrens standards, a fortress. No gang could operate freely in the brickyard neighborhood unless they belonged there. It wasn't the Boys particularly, but the thousands of residents who, while hardly on excellent terms with one another, were hardly willing to allow outsiders to roll through their homes. The last gang who had tried that had never come back out, though the yardies were disposing of their own fallen for days after. Most of the adult residents had grown up in the Boys, considered them family...

But the Boys weren't limited to the tenements anymore, in fact Crowbar had set up shop in one of the garages to be closer to the action. When the Wartoad crashed through the wall, he was one of the first to go down, mangled by the modified dumptruck. Many of the boys retreated to the tenements, shell shocked and confused, many of the newer members holed up in the second chop shop, and planned to fight back. Unorganized, confused and lacking anyone willing to step into Crowbars shoes right away, their petty war was fueled by outrage and numbers. Trojan and Johnny Soho, both old Peacoats lead retaliatory raids against the Kings while Rico manned the walls of the remaining garage with the younger boys.

That ended, along with most of the surviving Peacoats, when UVN, secretly allied with the Asphalt Kings, burned the second Chopshop to the ground with most of the remaining gang still inside. Rico got lucky, blown out a back window, outside the fire and left for dead, Drip… well, kids like him are hard to keep pinned down. The rest? Well, suffice it to say, when the raiders got back, bloodied and looking to rally up against the Kings pursuing them, they didn’t find a warm welcome.

Plenty of survivors though. The Boys were always a large gang, and the tenements were still safe ground, though these days wearing the coat might get you booted. The Kings and the Ultraviolence Nation are still willing to rumble at the sight of a Peacoat, and the Yardies don't want to invite trouble. Best just to scatter the Brickyard Boys and return to the old ways, when no one wanted to mess with them. That meant any of Crowbar’s old crew, especially those with few ties to the Yard, weren’t welcome, left to fend for themselves. No one’s using the name Brickhouse Boys, but the old party hard crew, a little smaller, a little grimmer, light up the yard a night, and the young kids still run in their packs. Some say the Old Guard have had their taste of the streets and plan to never go back. Others say they’ve got their taste of the power and wealth of being a real gang, and its only a matter of time until someone else takes over and tries again. Some even say Crowbar made it out alive, that he’s holed up, recovering from his injuries, and when he does he’ll be back, some sort of gutter messiah to lead the Boys once more.

Only time will tell.

[Bearclaw]

KICKASS!
That rocks. Nice job Spike.

[Spike]

Well, if you think it rocks, let the GM's know its ready for approval to go up on the wiki and post the sucker. It'd be inappropriate for me to do, since I'm out.

(IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)