[X] My Assistant

[The Jake]

Last Saturday we did the sequel of "The trouble with tempo", followed by "Flipside"

[ Spoiler ]

The runners acted as security for the meeting during the baseball game. Nothing special happened (or was meant to happen by the book) though the mage PC turned out to be a fan of the team playing, and spent the meeting watching the game, complete with fan-beer-hat on. The gunbunny stayed in the van on the parking lot, and shot a cat when it came too close, to be on the safe side.

Afterwards, the team openly discussed whether to kill Kaz' boss, or switch sides to Kaz' boss and kill Kaz. Kaz considered that to be psychotricks to get more money. He did get a bit more cautious though.

While Kaz was preparing his master plan, the PCs got another job - Flipside, from the "The Source" arc. Since our PCs are working undercover for the mob, this run was not done for the Cartel, but the mafia sent the runners out to catch a possible alternative source of tempo while they were waiting for Kaz' next job. They also heard that others, competitors within the mob, were also hunting the dealer.

With the mob as Johnson, they could skip all legwork - the mob already knew where Smalls was working. The runners planned to send in two of them posing as elf groupies, and the Physad as backup, to nab the dealer under the guise of seducing him. The rest of the team watched the feeds from the cybereyes of the two front runners.

The two tried to enter the bathroom Smalls was in, but a bruiser from the mob, part of the group of four that was "interrogating" the elf, barred the way. The mage recognised those as mobsters, and competition, and told the physad to "knock them out" - inside joke for "Kill them", stemmed from the physad overkilling a target they needed to get alive by getting something like 18 successes on the melee test (edge and a lot of 6s) while trying to knock the target (which was recovering inside a hospital from surgery) out.

So the physad jumped at the first mafia thug, severly wounding him and knocking him down, then jumped into the melee with the remaining three, hitting two of them at once, again for much damage, and avoding a taser shot by the third. The two other runenrs took the first thug down while the physad stomped the other three, starting with the taser guy. Smalls was very grateful, for about 3 seconds - the runners did not rally listen to his thanks, but knocked him out, and dragged him to the waiting van.

A bit later smalls was not very grateful anymore, when he was getting interrogated by the mob, with the mage's detect lies spell running. Smalls was disposed of after he had spilled his source, Vilamoura, and the runners were ordered to get ahold of him.

Their decker found the adress easily, and also found out the man had rented two apartments on the 4th floor. The runenrs drove there with their new van, and encountered two armored limousines. The gunbunny blew both up with rockets, then shot a few WP grenades into the entrance of the building, where thugs were taking cover. That exit covered, and the building starting to catch fire, they covered the fire escape since they knew the apartments rented were right next to that. The gunbunny suspected that the enemies inside could run down a floor or two, and then use the fire escape, and was getting ready to shoot all who ran outside, but did not shoot when a mother with her two children appeared. Instead she fired a HE grenade into both apartments, followed by a neurostun grenade.

Since the adventure writeup stated that "anything more volatile than a narcoject dart is liable to cuase a chemical fire", the HE grenade caused a big explosion, which blew out the windows.

At that point, the spirit threw two thugs out of the windows, which caused the runners to answer with WP grenades. Vilamoura, on fire, but his aura calm and not in pain, walked out on the fire escape, laughing, then - when the spirit left - screamed and quickly died, falling down. Unfortunately, the mage had not been observing the guy astrally, so missed the spirit. The runners fled the scene before the fire brigade arrived. Mr. Johnson was not amused that the mage had not assensed the scene.


Critic:
Ttrouble with Tempo Sequel: The scene between Kaz and his boss was good, although looked more like a cutscene than a scene runners were able to take part in. That might cause some players to screw it up just so they can cause something, instead of just listening to the description of the GM.
Flipside: Solid adventure framework, though the presence of the runners at the climax with the delegation from the cartel feels a bit forced. I'd not see them taking hired help there.

That's hillarious. Your PCs sound like a riot. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

I have to say after my reading of 'Flipside' that there is a lot that can go wrong. Most PCs I know would have that lab blow up in seconds.

- J.

[kanislatrans]

I have to say after my reading of 'Flipside' that there is a lot that can go wrong. Most PCs I know would have that lab blow up in seconds.

- J.

pretty much esplains what happened with us. It seems the more we try not to blow things up the bigger the tick-tick bang when it finally does go boom. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/grinbig.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/grinbig.gif)

[Prime Mover]

As Kanis said in his post above Flipside was a big BOOM. Drone and adapt made it into lobby, drone and astral mage got a look at what was going on in apartment. Vilamoura had enough time to reach his drug lab and even though the Yak soldiers held back after experiencing his new strength he reached a burner and set off the explosion.

After that we moved onto the Trouble with Tempo. This went alittle strange at first. The team attempted to lure Caine out. (For only the second time since we started GC our uber hacker has been tracked. Both times by Caines comm which by no means should have been able too. Just some amazing rolls by both parties. A group of ragers mounted up on bikes and headed to the comm they were tracking. This allowed Caine to barricade himself in and prep his escape. The team encounters the bikes halfway to Caines den and a "nazi war door" and a napalm spell later and there back on the road. Team arrives blast there way in after clearing the druged out hookers from the street. (a spat of compassion?) Hacker takes all nodes in building, adapt busts in and the rigger starts pouring suppressive fire into the upper floor windows. A quick sweep of the building and finish off whats left of Caines men the adept pursues Caine to his hidden bike, stick and shocks him down and gets a new BIKE.

At this point the team insists on keeping tabs on there meal ticket...err employer. Astral and drone overwatch escort Kaz to his meeting with Greywolf and see first hand what happens. Kaz is convinced the drug has made him invincible and the teams mage is still at a loss. Although he has taken a sample of tempo back to his lodge so they can study it closer. I've also added some magical support to Inoues team a misguided shaman who Chikao has manipulated into helping "fight" this tempo craziness.

For the climax once the team learns were the yaks are staying faster then expected they begin monitoring there comm traffic. Due to there expedience I allowed them to find out the cars were in route. They intercepted them and picked up Inoues team there selves. A fake edited comm call later and they were taking Chikao and his men to an empty warehouse the team has recently come into possession of to "meet the Oyabun". We stopped as the cars rolled into the darkened warehouse and Chikao began to get suspicious.

[Fuchs]

No new run directly from GC, just an intermezzo this week.

[ Spoiler ]

The mage gets invited to an exclusive "Midnight Ball" - by both the girlfriends he has been juggling for a while, without either knowing of the other. Since he doesn't want either to get mad - the model has, as he found out a bit ago, some protective childhood friend that is a ranking member of the Vory, and the other girlfriend is a vampire - he comes up with the plan to have the decker impersonate him for the model thanks to a shapechange spell sustained by a spirit, and go with the vamp, using a disguise there (citing some trouble) so there are not two of him walking around. The decker is supposed to use some personasims and chips to simulate him, and some direct coaching over commlink if needed. He does not mention this plan to the rest of team - not knowing that the physad got an invite too, thanks to a tempo-induced accident of a friend of hers.

The ball starts well, with the mage managing to keep clear of the disguised decker, and feed him the right lines. The physad - going with a good looking but not too bright pro footballer as a date, not that she's very smart either - gets a bit confused when she spots the two couples one after the other - she knows both women - but doesn't investigate.
Things start to go bad when the physad spots a suspicious couple trailing the "mage", and informs the mage of this - who gets a bit confused until he remembers that she is talking about the decker that looks like him right now. The decker goes to the bathroom, followed by the man of the trailing couple, and then the mage enters as well while outside he physad and her date and the rest wait.

Inside, the mage is taking his time until the suspect draws a narcoject gun, putting a dart into the mage (thinking it's a witness), then fires at the decker disguised as the mage. The mage goes down, but managed to yell "He's got a gun!", the decker manages - with incredible luck - to evade. The Vampire starts for the door, wanting to help. The physad would do the same, but her date just heard gun, and proceeds to take her to the ground and shield her with his own body, effectively pinning her - not even her magically enhanced skills and edge help her (bad rolls) getting out from that (pro footballer (linesman) has good rolls).

The vampire smashes into the bathroom, and the door smashes into the critcially glitching decker, knocking him out - and out of sight of the vamp, who then takes down the man with the narcoject pistol. The woman that was with that suspect draws a taser, and starts for the bathroom too, but the physad lashes out with her free leg, and despite the hindrance from being pinned down, manages to get incredibly lucky (14 hits with edge) and kills the woman on the spot, making it look like an accident.

Security arrives now, and both mage and decker are taken to the hospital. As it turns out, the two attackers were sent to kidnap the mage - their Mr. Johnson mistakenly assumes that the mage was the author of a new mage research thesis that was published using his home node (which in reality was the work of the dead mage that lived in that flat before, and now haunts it as a ghost.)

Next week we should continue with the regular GC events.

[pbangarth]

No new run directly from GC, just an intermezzo this week.

[ Spoiler ]

The mage gets invited to an exclusive "Midnight Ball" - by both the girlfriends he has been juggling for a while, without either knowing of the other. Since he doesn't want either to get mad - the model has, as he found out a bit ago, some protective childhood friend that is a ranking member of the Vory, and the other girlfriend is a vampire - he comes up with the plan to have the decker impersonate him for the model thanks to a shapechange spell sustained by a spirit, and go with the vamp, using a disguise there (citing some trouble) so there are not two of him walking around. The decker is supposed to use some personasims and chips to simulate him, and some direct coaching over commlink if needed. He does not mention this plan to the rest of team - not knowing that the physad got an invite too, thanks to a tempo-induced accident of a friend of hers.

The ball starts well, with the mage managing to keep clear of the disguised decker, and feed him the right lines. The physad - going with a good looking but not too bright pro footballer as a date, not that she's very smart either - gets a bit confused when she spots the two couples one after the other - she knows both women - but doesn't investigate.
Things start to go bad when the physad spots a suspicious couple trailing the "mage", and informs the mage of this - who gets a bit confused until he remembers that she is talking about the decker that looks like him right now. The decker goes to the bathroom, followed by the man of the trailing couple, and then the mage enters as well while outside he physad and her date and the rest wait.

Inside, the mage is taking his time until the suspect draws a narcoject gun, putting a dart into the mage (thinking it's a witness), then fires at the decker disguised as the mage. The mage goes down, but managed to yell "He's got a gun!", the decker manages - with incredible luck - to evade. The Vampire starts for the door, wanting to help. The physad would do the same, but her date just heard gun, and proceeds to take her to the ground and shield her with his own body, effectively pinning her - not even her magically enhanced skills and edge help her (bad rolls) getting out from that (pro footballer (linesman) has good rolls).

The vampire smashes into the bathroom, and the door smashes into the critcially glitching decker, knocking him out - and out of sight of the vamp, who then takes down the man with the narcoject pistol. The woman that was with that suspect draws a taser, and starts for the bathroom too, but the physad lashes out with her free leg, and despite the hindrance from being pinned down, manages to get incredibly lucky (14 hits with edge) and kills the woman on the spot, making it look like an accident.

Security arrives now, and both mage and decker are taken to the hospital. As it turns out, the two attackers were sent to kidnap the mage - their Mr. Johnson mistakenly assumes that the mage was the author of a new mage research thesis that was published using his home node (which in reality was the work of the dead mage that lived in that flat before, and now haunts it as a ghost.)

Next week we should continue with the regular GC events.

Why? Where you are sounds like way more fun!

[The Jake]

My campaign is shaping up beautifully.

One of my PCs has purchased the black market pipeline + day job qualities and now turning it (with the help of the PCs) into a fully fledged arms dealing business (with occasional drug shipment).

They've got a factory located in Everett right by the docks and they have managed to build a rather large underground area underneath the building. They're essentially got a nice little supply of cash coming in monthly. I'm balancing that against the number of expenses and efforts they have to go to in order to maintain it (and their desire to keep it at its current size and fly below the radar).

At the moment, the funds just cover the costs of running the business and after the bribes, expenses, kickbacks, etc, just enough to contribute a decent pool of funds to the monthly cash pool.

The Vory represents one supply channel. They've now also got channels with Lone Star (a couple of corrupt cops colluding to occasionally fence contents from the evidence locker marked for destruction), an mysterious buyer who is exceptionally well dressed, drives a BMW and doesn't ask questions (my PCs don't read here!)

[ Spoiler ]

The Johnson is fronting for Tamanous

, a Metroplex Guardsmen fencing ammo off a gunnery range (supposedly used/spent munitions), they're also dealing with a crooked accountant with a BAD habit who is helping them get a few shipments a year through Ares Arms (they're planning a big hack against Ares now to hack their accounting software which they've caught wind of is in the middle of an upgrade).

They realised however the need to increase their security. Because they're based in Everett, they've hired the First Nations (they picked them out because they were local).

With a few drug using contacts, contacts in the First Nations and their arms/drug dealing business, they're perfectly primed to start the campaign... mwuahahah....

- J.

[Fuchs]

Why? Where you are sounds like way more fun!

That kind of stuff still going on as well, of course. But after taking part in a simsense production, and a two-week trip to Paris with a billionaire (who had his own agenda), some underworld business looks very appealing (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

(The mage is "very used" to having trouble with juggling identities - the aforementioned vory officer actually warned one of his identities to stay the heck away from the mage's girlfriend, and that if anything happend to her boyfriend (which was his other identity), he'd be blamed quite painfully.)

So yes, it's a very whacky campaign. Not quite P2.0 levels, but not your usual "trenchcoat style".

[Fuchs]

After two sessions of introducing a new character we did the finale of the first arc - Tokyo Fireworks:

[ Spoiler ]

After getting the gear of the new member - sports car, racing bike, and weapons - from the warehouse it was delivered to from Italy, the team met with Kaz in a run-down bar and got the gist of the job: Killing two Yakuza leaders in a casino.

(I skipped the "Frame the mafia", since Kaz doesn't want to make the mob mad in this version, not in a city (Miami) where the mob is considerably stronger than in the adventure's original Seattle. I moved the location of the casino to Orlando, and made it Yakuza-run. I also changed the FBI to the CAS agency.)

The runners did not want to use explosives - the old character would have wanted to - and decided on a simpler, more "Nikita" approach: Smuggle weapons in, then simply walk in the private room, grenades first, SMG burst second, then flee through the side entrance right next to the private gambling room.

That settled, the team drove up in three cars to Orlando, the new italian member driving like crazy and cursing left and right at the stupid american drivers, and then spent the next three days in Disneyworld until it was time to move to the casino/hotel for the hit. The decker of the group checked in and probed/hacked into the security system from the inside, taking the cameras and sensors over - but didn't get the police surveillance system. The rest of the team spent their time at the gambling tables, making or losing extra money.

When both yakuzas had arrived two members of the team had dinner delivered to their room, and promptly overpowered the servers, dressing up as staff and hiding the weapons under the metal cover of the plates, then took the elevator down. The rest left their gambling tables right on time to meet them outside, right in front of the private gambling room, all acting nicely, then exploded into action, grabbing the guns and grenades, and storming the room.

The two adepts went first, one throwing two HE grenades into the room, the other shooting two SMGs at the Oyabun. 4 and ten hits meant one dead oyabun, 2 grenades going off in a 5x5 meter room meant lots of dead and wounded other people - and two adepts barely jumping to safety when the fragments filled the room.

The team then went (back) into the room, capping the second target into the head to make sure, and out the other door, right on to the backdoor where a rented escape car was driving on autopilot up to the door. At this time the Police was in full alert, storming out of the building accross the street, rifles at the ready - they had had no time to prevent the hit in the few seconds from spotting the weapons getting drawn to the shooting. The runners piled into the escape van, wondering about the fast response time - the players wondered too - and the mage threw a fireball at the running cops, BBQing two while two others jumped clear. The firearms adept used two FN P90s to lay down suppressive fire, making the two unwounded cops take cover, and the van sped off. Right when they wanted to change cars a police chopper showed up, but the mage managed to use trid phantasm to cover them while the van sped out on autopilot, chased by the chopper.

The team managed to make their escape, the mage (with a new face) conning his way through a roadblock while the rest got out without any trouble in their vehicles.

Back at Kaz they got the money, and heard that Kaz' partners were in need of professionals such as the runners (to facilitate the switch to the second arc, I assume Kaz is under pressure from the cartel to "hand over" the team for the cartel's use).

Apart from the GC-run, the two adepts of the team, both with cover identities as students, volunteered for help with an upcoming joint expedition of the history and magic department (the mage is assistant to the "Mad Mage" professor, with a betting pool running on how long he'll last - most of his precedessors are dead or insane, but he's been lasting long so far), since one of the adepts is very interested in treasure hunting. They also met an old acquaintance, an archeologist who hired the team once for security for an expedition at the Rio Grande, and whose dead uncle haunts the team mage's apartment as a ghost.

Next up is a trip to the Bermuda triangle, thanks to the new character's interest for mysteries. That should also make running the upcoming Dawn of the Artefact campaign easier, provided it is any good.

[Prime Mover]

Last two sessions.....got alittle busy last week and didn't get to post.

[ Spoiler ]

The showdown with Inoue and his team nearly ended badly with Inoue and his team pinned between two cars and half of his people down Inoue got several lucky heavy pistol shots off disabling two drones while one of his men dropped the teams adept. With the caster taking cover our rigger final arrives late and saves his character from NPC limbo and saves the day.

Next is the meeting with Grey Wolf and the team is taken aback. For the first time realizing that Kaz's operation may not be as stable or secure as they've been lead to believe.

Kaz pulls it together though and after some discussion has the team firmly back on his side. Convincing them that with one final strike he will consolidate his power and with the teams help will be one of most powerful syndicates in Seattle. And he's invincible after all!

The team does there legwork. Hacker sets up on a nearby building while a contact of the hacker gets room in the hotel and they set a laser link and retrans unit in the building to get around the wifi negation. The team kidnaps the supremely paranoid "fingers" and find him held up and heavily armed in his apt. They enter the building under the guise of drone repairmen and get access to his neighbors apt and strike from there. Have to face his chimeric guard pet (cat/rabbit) before meeting the heavily armed "fingers". Going the underground route they then use earth spirits and gear to breach the basement were they plant an explosive charge in a disguised slot machine and place "fingers" nearby.

The aftermath of this explosion catches the team off guard. Expecting to be at the side of an up and coming syndicate leader. When Kaz takes credit for the blast they all turn an awful shade of grey. "Do you know how many Yaks we've killed....." With some minor changes I have the delegation contact the team separately and offer to bring them along on there pac rim tour. Hating to see good assets wasted. And seeing Kaz and anything he's involved in as doomed. For some reason compassion, lust or other the team decides Dae needs saved so as not to suffer any retaliation that Kaz may face. Secretly contacting her and offering to support and keep her safe. Dae being a survivor see's her life with Kaz as being a short one and makes the logical decision. The team extracts her from under Kaz's nose.

On too Hong Kong. The teams Adept is from HK and reconnects with his contacts. The team gets a tour of some of the cities hot spots. Unload some drugs and contraband they acquired in Seattle. After some rest and the royal treatment at the peninsula hotel for a few days its back to business. Some skill chips and training in the hotel pool and there off on board the Pok Guy for there next mission.

The captain successfully convinces the team to raid the ship before they sink it after a cordial dinner were they seem to hit it off. After the mission I told them how much they could have sold they boat for and they kicked themselves for being so loyal and sinking her.

Hacker finds some signals when they intercept the smoke circle ship including one in the water trailing it. (let em detect a comm in a sharks belly) After chumming off the sharks some of the team use the human torpedo's to board and then head to the bridge. After shutting down the ship the "dead" capt rises from his seat and attacks. The other Shedim come up from below. A combination of well placed shots, monowhip and napalm spell clear the deck after an early near win by the Shedim.

From there onto Kowloon after a few days rest. The team is shaken by the sights,sounds and smells of this slum. Even more so when there told hundreds of its inhabitants will are closing in. Taking one of the barricades and placing booby trapped drones and wireless grenades on the street beyond them. This was a bloody free for all, explosions, fire, random gunfire, weakened spells, drone strafing and chaos. The team successfully held there barricade for several rounds until others began to collapse and they realized they'd soon be surrounded. Fell back to the courtyard making sure everyone was headed up to the evac chopper. Once on the roof and realizing not just on the ground but the surrounding rooftop hundreds of attackers closed in did everyone get a serious chill. That set up for the arrival of the Yama Kings and the visual of Chin You on the roof getting strafed by the chopper. The smoke,fire,tear gas and background count all working against them. The quick thinking mage put a mana barrier around Chin You buying some time for the attempt to reach the choppers ladder. (Chins stats are off and require some fixing but easy enough to do, gave him aspected background count as well cause the team was getting getting cocky.)
Most of there attacks just angering or delaying him as everyone got to the ladder. Chin made a move of his own getting to the choppers landing skid and hanging on as it pulls away. Early in the fight Chin nearly brings the chopper down and kills the gunner and co-pilot as well as wounding the mage and adept. Teams mage,adept and spirits weaken him as well as an edge fueled burst from the choppers guns. As the chopper gains altitude and rises above the aspected mana ebb Chin You weakens and finaly succombs to the teams combined assults. (about 1 round from Chin You's victory)

Modifed side mission has the team capture one of the drugged ghouls as well before heading to Tokyo and just getting settled in before we stopped for the day.

[The Jake]

Ran the first adventure of 'First Taste' this evening - A Stranger In Our House. Didn't quite finish it but here's how it went so far-

[ Spoiler ]

One of the PCs (who is a drake with the Wanted flaw) found out in a particularly gruesome fashion that his father was murdered. It was around the same time the PCs got a call from their fixer to meet Dae at Ticklers.

(NOTE: PCs never believe in coincidence - ever. So they spent the next 30min debating if they should attend the job, thinking it was a setup in some fashion). The troll merc spends the rest of the session evaluating their factory security and does nothing (effectively) for the rest of the session. I am sorely tempted to never weave in a PC subplot into a campaign adventure ever again after this evening.

Eventually, they decide to attend the meet anyway. They reluctantly agree to the job - feeling a conflict of interest. What isn't known to Dae is that the PCs are running an arms dealing business on the side and because of the Everett location, paying protection money to the First Nations (and dealing arms to them as well). They choose to do the job because it appears to be little more than spying at this stage, and they have professional reputations to uphold.

They begin doing some investigation into Dae, Xa Firebird and Alec Littletree. Through their contacts they find out who Dae is (but not who she is representing) and how to track down Alec and Xa. Preliminary checks find that Dae is wanted for questioning (classified: Organised Crime Task Force), Xa has an arrest record and some cyberware (possession, assault - faked of course) and Littletree has nothing but is known to associate with several suspicious figures (I figure as a speaker adept he's unlikely to be caught in a hurry).

The team split up at this juncture to investigate.

One PC, an eagle shapeshifter, with an intellect that ranges from insane genius to just plain insane, decides to tail Littletree. After an hour of jerking all the players around trying to figure out how he could cleverly spy on him without being detected, he finally learned that Caine is receiving tempo for the Ragers. Because the shapeshifter never made face-to-face contact with Caine, I've sidestepped the scene where Caine confronts the PCs (for now). Through their contacts at the Star, they work out who Caine is and piece together that Littletree is selling to the Ragers.

Second team of PCs tracked Xa to a frat party near Seattle University. One of the PCs (a former academic researcher/PhD hermetic) decides to try and crash the party with the help of the drake (in his 20s), decide to masquerade as legitimate uni students. The drake PC bumps into Xa.

NOTE: Because of the pre-existing relationship between the First Nations and my PCs, I felt that the key FN members would recognise certain members of the PCs. The drake happens to be the face of the group and thus is known. Xa rolled a high Perception test, Drake PC FUBARed a defaulted Shadowing test.

At this point, Xa recognises the PC and asked what he was doing there. PC does some quit witted bluffing he is there to enjoy the party and do some business. Xa, while naturally suspicous doesn't immediately suspect the PC (although he finds it odd, he is distracted by other matters). Their paths don't conflict so the situation is written off as circumstance.

Through clever use of spirits, astral perception they realise that Xa is melancholic selling to the students (which they find odd) and has an odd amount of cyberware in his head.

They realise that this frat house is in the process of organising a full blown tempo orgy party with another (female) frat house. The drake using his Flexible Signature and Astral Perception and clever acting to fake a 'tempo' high and witnesses the full effects of tempo and the emotional feedback loop. They oversee Xa talking to some other gang members about hooking up with 'some random bored housewife' the next day and the PCs decide to tail him to that meet. After the party, the PCs think that the Drake is a lucky, lucky bastard.

Fast forward to the next day - one of the PCs uses his air spirit and astral projection to tail Xa Firebird. The astral projecting hermetic follows Xa and overhears the conversation with Carla Mathers (Xa's liason officer). During their brief, Xa mentions he met someone he dismissed as 'coincidence' at the frat party deal last night. Xa knows the PC, the location of their factory and that the FN is being paid for protection (but not the full extent of what they do at the factory) and asks her to look into it. PCs mentally shit themselves thinking their whole jig is up. Also based of the PCs assessing realises she too has a large amount of headware. They track Carla by her car, 'office location' and through their contacts learn that she's Lone Star and they're both undercover.

They immediately contact Dae who offers them 10k each to assassinate Xa immediately with a request to do it before that evening (because that's when the First Nations heads to the KondOrchid factory to make the next pickup). My PCs do not like 'wetwork' jobs and don't like whacking cops either. They also realise that this is now a two for one deal and have to do in Xa as well as Carla (before dark) and destroy all the evidence because she could have enough dirt to implicate them and expose their growing arms dealing business as well as the First Nations tempo dealing.

They plan on making Xa's death an 'accident' (literally - Force 6 air spirit using Accident on Xa on the freeway). They haven't worked out how they're going to get rid of his handler but I expect it to be bloody.

They've technically completed the adventure, but I'm not awarding karma until they've done away with Xa and Carla.

More to come...

- J.

[AJCarrington]

Thanks for the AAR - looking forward to hearing how things turn out / progress.

AJC

[The Jake]

Ok, finished 'Stranger In The House' tonight. More spoilers ahead....

[ Spoiler ]

Tonight was mostly about killing off Xa Firebird and his handler.

What was difficult was the players spent most of the session figuring out how they could make them disappear off the face of the planet without a shred of evidence being left behind. I was actually very impressed by their efforts.

To recap, Dae relayed the intel back to Kaz that Xa was a cop. Kaz tells Dae he must be removed before that evening. She doesn't know about the Kond Orchid delivery, only that Kaz said it must be done before 6pm (dark). Dae then asks the PCs to eliminate the cops on short (~4 hrs) notice. This put them on the backfoot immediately.

PCs, through their connections with the First Nations, got a hold of Xa's commlink number. A.I. hacker goes to town. Learns about the blind drops. Shoots off an email to Carla the Handler "Cover blown. Meet at usual spot asap" (words to that effect).

It was at this point the A.I. critically glitched hacking Xa's commlink as he issued commands as admin (I described this as committing an 'rm -rf *' as the root user in Unix for anyone that cares).

Meanwhile, other PCs disguise themselves as a cleaning crew for the sleazy hotel Harrington's. She walks into room looking for Xa - all worried. They basically stun baton her, chuck her into a large metal crate (magnetically sealed) and stick it in a faraday cage they have embedded into a truck (purpose built for smuggling - carefully designed to block out errant transmissions and signals). Before doing so they strip her down and loot her gear. Before I forget, these crates are used as part of an elaborate smuggling operation to steal stuff from the Lone Star evidencary lockers marked for destruction. The crates with these cops bodies will be shuffled into that operation in a way that effectively, Lone Star will be disposing the bodies of their own police (oh, irony!).

They watch with some amusement as the Doc Wagon and medics turn up only to realise that the signal has gone cold, they see no evidence of anything wrong and can't find their client. They up and leave, wondering if its a system glitch or the like.

PCs find her commlink and gives this to the A.I. hacks that one pronto. Again, similar message is sent, this time to Xa "Someone has tried to hack my commlink. Meet at usual point." (words to that effect). Xa turns up but is a bit suspicious.

Bear in mind, his commlink mysteriously glitched up on him. He wonders if her commlink has been hacked by the same guy who did his. He knows that this is suspicious but given its from his handler (whom he is developing feelings for and not thinking with the big head as much), meets the usual protocols (although the time is off) he feels he has to take a chance. He turns up at the hotel. Despite the suspicion and some combat skills, he is hopelessly outskilled, outclassed outgunned. PCs quickly subdue and search him. Into crate #2 he goes.

PCs head back to their base (missing Doc Wagon repeating the process as last time). The A.I. hacks his commlink and cyberware as well as hers and realise just how much dirt he acquired on the First Nations and the tempo operation to date (NOTE: I couldn't find anywhere in the books how long Xa was undercover for - so I said 18 months to allow for the fact he is a lieutenant the gang. Any less just seemed implausible to gain that rank).

Not content to leave it there, PCs decide to search Carla's cover operation (a small real estate agency in Tacoma - I winged it). I ruled that the place has some (hasty) security but not so much it would draw suspicion. Building security hacker was killed by the A.I with Black Hammer. PCs are careful of the wards and watcher spirit. The spy breaks in and looted almost anything that wasn't nailed down and looking relevant. He blows up the office with a block of C-12 to remove anything else that is vaguely incriminating (they didn't want to leave so much as a shred of hair there).

Net result:
- One demolished building
- One dead security hacker
- Two very dead cops and a dead undercover investigation
- Two very confused Doc Wagon response teams

The PCs report back to Dae on Littletree selling to Caine (without alerting the Ragers or Littletree as well) and the final conclusion on Xa Firebird. Now bear in mind that Xa and his handler have been ghosted in a way that will leave no evidence, all before Xa could witness the tempo pickup from KondOrchid (the crates I mentioned earlier are smelted, unopened). PCs hand Dae (and Kaz) all the dirt Lone Star have acquired on their activities for approximately the past 18+ months (18 is the a minimum). Subsequently this impressed the hell out of Dae (and by extension Kaz).

Seriously, this job was so impressive, I'm tempted to give them additional Reputation points.

Following some of their personal subplots - two PCs paid off their Wanted and Mysterious Implant flaws respectively, which take out a major thorn in the team's side that has been gnawing on them for awhile. Essentially, a company man NPC (former partner of the PC spy) who works for S-K - and known to have killed the drake PC's father - has agreed to stop hunting them in exchange for them doing work for S-K from time to time. PCs agree as a fair exchange - despite some hard feelings (PC Spy has been unwittingly broadcasting all he sees and hears back to the company man and thus compromised the PCs arms smuggling operation thanks to the Mysterious Cyberware flaw). I think they're working out how they can get revenge, if they can...

Next session I plan on dealing with some of the more personal elements of flipside and how its affecting the streets. I'm getting a few ideas now.

More to come.

- J.

[pbangarth]

It's amazing what different tacks two separate teams can take in the same scenario.

My group is now working on the raid on the DocWagon facility to get the body. The team (in character to a large degree) has not been long on planning, and their dice rolling is abysmal, but they have survived the Stranger in the House section intact. They are regrouping after a painful reminder of the kind of defenses a wealthy, determined corp like DocWagon can put in play. They are getting good at thinking themselves out of the holes they put themselves into.

However, their inital research and legwork during the surveillance jobs gave them a clue about the underlying threat involved with Tempo, and they have followed up on that clue to be way ahead of the game in their understanding of what is going on. One of the two PC mages has a contact who is addicted to Tempo, and crying for help from her magic friend. The mage has discovered the astral links of the Spirit Pact on her friend, and is considering following the threads to see what they lead to. The whole campaign could take a left turn really quickly.

I look forward to the next session.

[SincereAgape]

Reading threads like this make me want to overcome GM burnout (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[wylie]

as pbangarth, it is amazing what different groups do

the group I am GMing posed as the funeral home, with the hacker hacking in ahead they were to pick up the body
in and out quietly & painlessly

its the subplots thats beating the group down

right now I'm at a crossroads, whether to use flipside or tokyo fireworks, as I want to finish the story arc, but 2 of my players are leaving soon. i have 2 new palyers coming to take their place though.

all I am gonna say about trouble with tempo is; there were lots of bullets on the highway and 5 yakuza bodies (leader taken and the last to fall), and one soldier lived by hiding behind a guardrail after the group blew up the car he was using as cover

[ScandRun]

Contains the first adventure framework in Hong Kong.

[ Spoiler ]

I ran the first adventure framework out of Hong Kong tonight.

We started out with some shopping and sightseeing within Hong Kong some of the team got invited to join a dinner where they got introduced to HAK.

Some days later the team finds itself on the China Sea. On it's way to sink a cetain transport ship.

On the way there the captain starts convincing the team about boarding the ship instead of sinking it as ordered by Sacristan.

The team wisely is doubtful about accepting the offer. Some chatter about Gwailo Kung Pao chickens and the prospect of a half a million nuyen split within the team changes their mind however. I also screwed with them some claiming the black chrysanthemum controls the red orchid trade in Macao fencing the load there wouldn't be to upsetting to anyone, as the runners employers cooperate with Hak in Hong Kong. I also think Black Chrysanthemum controlling orchid trade in Macao is correct fluff wise.

Once in the water the team spots a school of sharks at a distance. Within the school of sharks appear a megalodontching some of the school of sharks.

This creates a mad rush onto the deck only to meet 7 shedim including a shedim master. First Troll muscle gets dropped by stunbolt, second troll one lucky roll from death, a lot of edge later, and the team eventually prevails.

Once the drugs have been secured the team starts hearing the ominous drums of the Hell thunder crew. A few well placed manaballs later and the team is free of pirate pursuit, and heading to Macao, offloading, and going back by speedboat into the Victoria harbour by sunset. Hard work for a half a mill right (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) ?

Easily one of the best adventure frameworks in the campaign IMO.

[Muspellsheimr]

Try using a

[ Spoiler ]

It makes things readable.

[ScandRun]

Yeah figured the hide function would do that, do not know how to make a spoiler really, otherwise one might mark the hidden areas maybe.

[pbangarth]

Type the word "spoiler", surrounded by square brackets, at the beginning, and the word "/spoiler", surrounded by square brackets, at the end.

[Fuchs]

After a wide and lengthy and partially meta-questy detour where the team grappled with personal issues and ghosts, and spirits, and magical katanas stolen by mysterious martial artists who get killed in PC's dojos, the infiltration of the Ghost Cartels continues.

[ Spoiler ]

The group had to earn the trust of the organisation behind the drug distributing gang - the Cartel. To help them with that their mafia johnson used his contacts to put pressure on the drug distributing gang so they would have to fall back on hiring the runners - or the cover identities the runners were posing as. That worked well and the runners were called in and hired as security for a money transport from the bank to the cartel.
They drove two identical limousines and their van - 5th van, same model, by now, and the Johnson is getting peeved about replacing it - and used a parking garage to switch the limousines around until no one would know where the one carrying the money was.
Unfortunately, a local gang, the comedians, had spotted the limousines in front of the bank and were after them using a bunch of bikes and two pick-up trucks. They started to come up from behind and the van let them pass, not sure what they were after. Then the bikes accelerated, and the limousines did too, and the pickups deployed LMGs to shoot some cars, to cause a traffic jam to get free reign for a bit.
The runner van carrying half the team slowed down in response, and played good civilian vehicle, expecting cops to arrive soon. The limousines started some stunt driving, jousting and ramming bikes while getting shot at until the pickups arrived and tested the armr on the limousine (it held, but the cars looked like pock-marked afterwards). An illusion of missile launchers extending from one car and firing bought a few seconds, not more, when the misisles "missed", and the ganger manning one LMG got lucky and downed a light patrol choper, and the cops put up a roadblock - which the two limousines and the two trucks were racing towards to at high speed. The team hacker barely managed to hack the controls to create a gap for the runner cars in time - and to stop the ganger trucks afterwards by raising the block again, which led to nice crossfire from the cops.
The runner cars sped off, aided by another illusion to mask the damages, and managed to reach the meeting in time with Kaz on board while the mafia used some grease to get the van off the cop's attention without checking the partly illegal stuff inside too closely. Runners get paid, once from cartel, once from the mafia.

Next job the runners get is straight from the cartel - the stealing of data gathered by some students about Tempo's side effect, and the killing of said students. Since all have an identity (or second life) as students or assistants at the university themselves that puts a slight quandary on the runners, and one of them, the gunbunny adept, states she won't kill students. The other adept - the knife and throwing adept - accepts the job though, so the Johnson is happy. That adept didn't really want to kill the students either though, and tries to formulate a plan to fake the killings, but (strangely) the mafia doesn't really see a need to help with risking the operation for the sake of three students, and time is pressing, and the team decker would probably squeal on the whole affair if brought in, so the adept resigns herself to the wetwork. Everyone else thinks she's just a ruthless killer anyway, ever since she killed a man recovering from serious surgery with a metal briefcase while trying to "knock him out".
The decker gets the data easily, but the studetns have backups offline in a safe in the lab, so the gun adept will have to infiltrate while the melee adept kills the students while they are out, investigating drug use in night clubs.
The first two are killed in a mafia-owned strip club, when all the attention of the audience is on the stage, and the security system is hacked not to show anything, by the adept using a knife to stab their brin from behind - with some edge easily done. The third student though is already at home, not being the social type, and the adept sneaks in, past his parents to messily kill him in his room - barely escaping when the mother comes in and finds her son bleeding to death.
Meanwhile teh gun adept has gotten a crash course in demolitions by the mafia Johnson and is sneaking into the lab of the university, surprising two addicts who try to steal the drug samples they expect in the lab. Other than that the blowing up the safe goes well, and the next day the group gets paid, and hired for thei trip to Hong Kong.

[The Jake]

I had previously told my players they were going to be undertaking some wetwork for a series of three Vory mob bosses in Vladivostok but this adventure had the potential to absorb significant chunks of my time in its development and take them away from Ghost Cartels - neither of which I have neither the time nor the inclination. So I cheapened the scenario down to a handful of random dice rolls to determine the level of success and level of injury and mishaps, winding up in the PCs being chased down a Vladivostok freeway by five bikers armed with AK-97 carbines while they're in an armored Nightsky.

In short, I wanted it to be dramatic in a scenematic action sense and not get bogged down in rules and alternate subplots. They got away and eventually back to Seattle, allowing me to run 'Body Snatchers'.

[ Spoiler ]

The PCs met with Kaz. After their roaring success of dealing with Xa Firebird, Kaz was keen to get them on board. In the interests of time, I had Kaz tell the PCs they were on the clock as he doesn't want the circumstances of the reporters death to become public or any of her research to become public as he believes its related to tempo sales. The PCs put 2 and 2 together and realised that the Komun'go are the ones supplying the First Nations. When Kaz explained the mission profile (steal the body from DocWagon), they grinned.

The PCs ages ago had forged a high rating DocWagon employee pass, complete with permits (and it cost them a mint) explaining they are a High Threat Response team - complete with permits to justify their hardware. These fake SINs/permits were also clean and unused. So they had valid ID to get into the facility - there was only one catch: they needed a reason to move the body and the team hacker was absent.

The PCs at this point realised that they needed an NPC hacker at this point for situations such as this, so they contacted one of their fixers. Using the rules from Unwired at a high level for guidance for paid NPC hacker services, I blew the dust off a skilled NPC hacker I made who basically will do any job but prefers to work during business hours and hates out of hours/short notice work such as the PCs charging so he charges double his usual rates. The PCs have surplus money and I am a big believer in 'Blackjack's Law Of Having Money Without Spending It On Anything'.

So I had a highly skilled hacker do the basics of the job (by the name of 'Glitch' - no relation to the NPC) - hack and forge a manifest and do some basic data search roles for the team. Now the irony is they were being paid 2k each with a 10k bonus to get rid of the data. The PCs were slugged for nearly 15k total ... this sounds harsh but my PCs were very keen at this point to make an impression on Kaz for getting the job done with an eye on future work. They were also spoonfed cash for this Russian job in the interest of speeding things along and I didn't want to give them easy cash as it was. So I didn't feel bad fleecing them as there was still a net gain in their favor as it was - to say nothing of the reputation boost that is sure to come. This struck me as being very professional and really focusing on their reputation. I was quite proud of them.

The PCs raided her apartment, got some random bits and pieces and left, just as the mother was entering to collect some personal effects. There was a Lone Star reporter outside as the apartment was supposed to be sealed until an autopsy completed to eliminate foul causes (I just assumed the mother was very pushy and officer bored/inept). PCs were reasonably thorough in their search - I assumed that they would learn about someone called Sinn and that she was investigating a series of murders but not the connection to the tempo or with Lone Star.

From when the team were engaged to when they retrieved the body - the sum duration was approximatel 3.5 hrs. I didn't have the doctor squeal like a little bitch as the module said as the PCs rocked up in DocWagon uniforms, with DocWagons SINs and forged (but legitimate appearing) documens supporting the move of the body before the autopsy. It seemed illogical for the doctor to scream just because the module called for it. Oh, and the PCs knocked before they entered the morgue.

Anyway, they turned the body over to Tamanous and thankfully, they threatened to call Kaz when they hiked the rate. Normally my PCs would have blown the ghouls away and used their own contacts to dispose of the body (they have contacts of their own with Tamanous and access to the furnaces used for destroying police evidence). They then called Kaz upon completion but my PCs barely remembered to check the commlink of the reporter or her box of persona effects (it took a bit of not so subtle prodding from me). Basically Kaz has indicated he is pleased but haven't fulfilled the terms of the contract (the whole Climax section of Body Snatchers). They realise that Fatimah and Jania were investigating a correlation to tempo sales but not yet unearthed the fact Jania believed Lone Star was covering up the murders.

Next session we will wrap up Body Snatchers fully.

- J.

[The Jake]

I should just start a new thread on my chronicle of the Ghost Cartels campaign.

My PCs were to wrap up 'Body Snatchers' tonight -admittedly I did spoon-feed them a bit but simply because of their tendency to drag their heels at times. But nothing they couldn't resolve themselves - only to speed it along.

[ Spoiler ]

After the PCs turned over Jaina's body to the ghouls in the Verge, they decided to follow up on what Jaina was investigating. They managed to pick up two clues - one that Caine (representing the Ragers) was involved in tempo sales and given their pre-existing contacts the First Nations, figured that since none of them know anything about her that presumably he would. They also wanted to find out what/how exactly he was distributing tempo after they found out Littletree was selling to them (also bear in mind that after killing Firebird and raiding his office they got access to the Lone Star file on tempo distribution in Seattle). To cut to the chase, they manage to (barely) get Sinn out alive. After interrogating Sinn and simulatenously capturing Caine* they took them both to an empty warehouse and proceeded to interrogate them. In a scene reminiscent of Reservoir Dogs, they basically found out what Jaina was investigating and that Caine was getting his tempo from backchannels within First Nations. They also learned that Caine is bucking for promotion and at first, the PCs thought that hoping to somehow supply the Ragers using their connections within the First Nations. They then realised this was never going to work out. It's worth noting that at this point they didn't know that the tempo related deaths were the result of a serial killer. It wasn't until they interrogated Sinn they learned this. They thought it was either overdoses or people somehow being killed for their affiliation to tempo sales. After talking to Sinn they realised there is more to it.

Realising they hit a wall, they called up Kaz who basically said they've fulfilled all they need to, just "make the problem go away". PCs kill Sinn and Caine and deliver the bodies to some Tamanous contacts of theirs. They get paid for an easy nights work with the promise of more to come. They asked Kaz if he wants them to investigate the serial killings, he said he's happy to pursue it from his end but willing to pay "if the leads are viable".

As a follow up, the PCs learned tonight by piecing one and one together that the First Nations are being supplied by the Ko'mungo and the Ragers are getting their stash from the First Nations (unofficially). What they didn't pick up on was who is supplying the Ko'mungo - or that anyone else would.

* I tried to get Caine to get away but shy of massive railroading, the PCs had more knowledge than the module called for based on their creativity and it would have been obvious that I was railroading if I had let him getaway. I didn't care if Caine was killed as I figured there is another Rager's member who has knowledge of the tempo and potential sources and would easily replace him. I well realise I am potentially diverging from canon here, but I figure if Caine has a replacement within the Ragers, the plot can proceed as normal with minimal railroading.

- J.

[The Jake]

Attack of the Double Post.

- J.

[Malachi]

* I tried to get Caine to get away but shy of massive railroading, the PCs had more knowledge than the module called for based on their creativity and it would have been obvious that I was railroading if I had let him getaway. I didn't care if Caine was killed as I figured there is another Rager's member who has knowledge of the tempo and potential sources and would easily replace him. I well realise I am potentially diverging from canon here, but I figure if Caine has a replacement within the Ragers, the plot can proceed as normal with minimal railroading.

Modules are made to be modified. If the PC's do something creative that diverges, go with the PC's actions and then tweak things in the later modules (just like you're doing). You made the right choice.

[The Jake]

Modules are made to be modified. If the PC's do something creative that diverges, go with the PC's actions and then tweak things in the later modules (just like you're doing). You made the right choice.

Cheers - thanks. My main goal is to stick to the crux of the story. I don't care if I diverge too much.

Having a third party with access to the tempo, undermining First Nations is what is critical. The particulars are largely incidental.

- J.