Gen Con, Fun Options

[TranKirsaKali]

Ok, now that I have regained consciousness, the con was a ton of fun. We had a blast. I just wanted to send a great big thanks out to all the people that invested their time in making the event so much fun to attend. The scramble was great. The Tournament a beautiful challenge to play outside my comfort zone. The missions. . . well they are missions so we all know that they are fun. But the GMing was great too. Getting to play with new GMs is always a fun thing. And now I have faces for names on this forum. *Evil Laughter* Once again thanks to everyone that made the Con so memorable for me and my husband. Chrome Monger and I are really looking forward to sharing our experiences with our friends and our usual team.

[BlueMax]

For those of us who were stuck on the other side of the rockies, do you have the pre event blurbs?

I would love to hear what the tournament was about.

BlueMax

[DireRadiant]

The tournament was about 20 years of Shadowrun in 2 four hour slots.

It did NOT fit.

We did it anyway.

[Game2BHappy]

The Missions, Scramble, and Tournament really were a lot of fun. A huge THANKS to all the volunteers that made it so!

[Redjack]

Ditto! We played as much Shadowrun as I have played in a year (times seven)! It was good for me to put names to faces as well and look forward to seeing you all again next year.

[BishopMcQ]

For everyone who didn't figure it out from listening to Bull and Caine, my character was a plant in the Scramble. Thanks all for a lot of fun.

Remember: Never take cigarettes from a runner you've never met.

Edit: Also, for the record, the "Dawkins Group" -- the table made up of freelancers who played in the Tourney-- well let's just say that they faced some challenges, failed to protect the thief, had more glitches than I've ever seen, and quit while they still had their hides. (I gave them high marks for humor and baked goods though...) I'm hoping to get another team like that together for next year's tourney, and will volunteer to GM for them again.

[Bull]

*shakes fist at Bishop*

For the Scramble, our team was hired to protect an NPC. We're locked inside this large vault with 30-some odd other Shadowrunners plus a bunch of other NPCs. There's an undetonated "Tank shell" that was more along the lines of a small warhead in the middle of the room.

So Bishop is playing a rather broken (i.e., unbalanced) Possession mage. He's wandering around the room offering up Laes ciggarettes to anyone who will take them, and randomly possessing people. Turns out there's ALSO a couple ghosts also randomly possessing people and causing problems. And killing off the occasional NPC. So within an hour or so, the rest of teams have us all huddled in one corner, protecting our NPC target, her bodyguard, and our original contact/guide. THey know Bish is with us, and think we're behind all the trouble, and are plotting to kill us. Doesn't help that my twitchy Sammy has pretty much had guns drawn and aimed around the room for most of the night.

So naturally, we start plotting a way to deal with everyone else, one way or another. Which involves throwing up a couple barriers (We had 3 mages on the team) and detonating the bomb and hoping for the best (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

It was... Interesting. Eventually things got sorted out, we survived the LARP section, and then right at the end, Bishop tries to cap our target. Thankfully, we manage to take him down, barely, POssession mages are broken I tell you! BROKEN!!! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) He was being inhabited by a Force 8 Great form, I believe, for the entire night, so had like 16 dice for everything, including hardened armor. Didn't help that one of our mages had gotten knocked unonscious, so he also called up a spirit to possess him. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

But, in the end, despite TR 6, we made it out in one piece, a bit battered and bruised, but we survived, got fat paid, and I restrained myself from lopping off McQuillan's head with my monowhip, and instead cut off a pinky as a reminder. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

<grin>

Bull

[BishopMcQ]

By unbalanced he means mentally...

[Tiger Eyes]

BishopMcQ set the record for mean gms at the freelancer table for the tourney. Next year, I'm bring more cookies. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Quince]

Thanks to everyone for a great time, especially the GMs!

At the Scramble, Quince was nervous playing with the 'Primes, but is thrilled to have survived and is hoping to have lost Red Shirt status. He's also ticked that he couldn't better handle the rampant spirits, and has made a mental note to figure out a way to deal with force 8s + TR6. And what's with all these cyberzombies and cybertooths that are coming out of the woodwork these days, anyway?

[Bull]

Hehe... Poor Quince (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) He got dragged along to the table by Penguin, so we had 6 Vets (One a filthy commie-mutant-traitor!) and his newbie mage (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) So we dubbed him Redshirt (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

However, as I said man... If you survived, you earned your name. Hence, you're Quince now. (Though it would be fun to change your title (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif) )

[LurkerOutThere]

I also wanted to toss my thanks out to all the GM's and people that made the Scramble and everything else work. You all pulled it off with style and flare and I had a ton of fun. Rattler got stuck with a 5 magic user table and I hope no one at the very magic heavy larp was too badly bruised by his behavior. For the record with all the spirits and the like around I was playing my Bias: Magic Users to the hilt so I hope no-one thinks me, or him too much of a jerk. Especially after the possession compounded by the fear affect.

All in all it was outstanding fun and myself and Robin/Red will definitely be back next year.

Addendum: Our teams mission was to destroy or recover the spirit chains and bring them back to our J. Now since they were destroyed in the LARP part of the scramble our GM. In a outstanding act of improvise had Alice (one of the spirits) anchor herself to the mage on our team who she'd been possesing at the time of the destruction. Fortunately he was able to creatively use the cleaning metamagic to force her into a bottle. Bob on the other hand had possesed one of the cyberzombies who we then had to go and crater. A magic and sticknshock barrage later the zombies were down and yet another popcan was employed as a spirit fetter. So in the end we all survived, which really suprised me, and we got compensated for our time and trouble. Lots of fun all around.

[Legend '09]

Thanks to Happy, Sleepy, Grumpy, Titsy, and Aaron for showing me the fun of the RPG world. Sleepy, I love my name but needed to amend it on the forum. Sunshine reverted to his home geek name and online handle of Delta but Legend lives on! Don't forget Pegasus on the SECOND Saturday if you are over our way.

Thanks to Kali, Chrome Monger, Ampulus, and our decked out elf (sorry, I am blanking on your name) for guiding us through the scramble! I learned my lesson on cigs from strangers but Amp saved me. I'll pay my penance, I promise (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

Hoping to stay at attached hotel next year. Any newbie advice/pricing info?

[LurkerOutThere]

This was my first year doing an attached hotel. You will need to get into the system as soon as it opens up and register. Barring that theres the waiting list which is what I had to do and did in fact work for me.

[TranKirsaKali]

ROFL and here I was attempting to avoid spoilers on anything just in case. The Scramble was amazing. All our team wanted to do was get out of that silly room. Our scientists to rescue were in the secret Ares lab next door. And I am really glad that Kali is a purist and will not pollute her body with anything but the occasional alcoholic beverage. I was very proud of our brand new to Shadowrun Hacker and Face. Ian and his Mom (Sorry Mom, my brain is spacing right now) really did a great job being thrown into the mix. As for the team that had their objects destroyed in the live action part. . . .
Well I am sorry about that but Kali isn't. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/blush.gif) She can't stand spirits possessing people against their will or being bound against their will. She is definitely one that revers and honor the spirits. So she had to set them free when the opportunity got to her. Drew your Satyr was great. It was a lot of fun running with you. And when Bishop says crazy he wasn't kidding. I hope I managed to put a stop to people taking your cigarettes in some small way. And dag nab it!!! Did you really have to try and dump me in the laps of our Cyberzombies? Sheesh trying to stay true to wolf and kill them while getting to my team was just not fun (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif) ! Although when Ian asked if he should work on hacking us out or helping us kill the cyberzombies I said get us out of here. And one of the wandering GMs looked at him and said ____ karma runner is running away from them. His comment was right getting us outta here. But we did manage to kill off our friends and save our scientists so all was good in the end. The whole experience was incredible and I am looking forward to doing it again. Next time Bull it might be fun to run with you instead of wanting to put your paranoid tail to sleep! LOL

And as for the Tournament, it was great too. We had a blast playing that and just seeing where the craziness took us. And I think I will shudder over the ending for years to come.

[BishopMcQ]

Crazy, maybe...lack of definitive sense of personality due to sharing headspace with Loa, definitely. My character was bouncing back and forth between first and third person references as the spirit's nature was closer to the surface. Everyone should also say thank you to Aaron who kept me from moving the bomb about 10 minutes into the Scramble when my team first came up with the idea of physical barriers, spirit possession and psychokinesis.

He didn't want me to kill all of the other teams immediately.

Edit: I had a lot of fun actually getting to play this year. I'm curious if I played next year if anyone would believe that I wasn't a plant...

[Dashifen]

Edit: I had a lot of fun actually getting to play this year. I'm curious if I played next year if anyone would believe that I wasn't a plant...

We didn't all know you were a plant this year!

[Caine Hazen]

Edit: I had a lot of fun actually getting to play this year. I'm curious if I played next year if anyone would believe that I wasn't a plant...

No, you play next year and I shot you point blank again with an assault cannon first thing off (IMG:style_emoticons/default/grinbig.gif) but out of love...

[Redjack]

No, you play next year and I shot you point blank again with an assault cannon first thing off (IMG:style_emoticons/default/grinbig.gif) but out of love...

Hot Damn! Now that will bring me back to the Scramble last year.

[LurkerOutThere]

Well unfortunately bishop did remind me of something unpleasant.

I think that if my comlink had actually gone splat I would have probably walked out of the campaign right then and there as it felt pretty arbitrary and random "Hey look i'm a powerfull NPC caster with no actual strictures on my behavior because LOL it's a LARP and i'm one of two powerful possessing free spirits present in a 50 foot radius" i would have probably just, quietly politely walked out right then as it had been a whole night of "techs are worthless" and that would have been a fine finish to it as considering your average rigger or hacker comlink runs them anywhere from 30-60k nuyen and is absolutely vital to continuing as a character, money that you arn't likely to see again.

I vote next year we hoid the scramble in VR so that the mages can enjoy having what ability, if any they have reduced to logic puzzles and Hackers/Riggers/Metasapients whatever can enjoy actually getting to do something other then try and solve logic puzzles in a darkened room.

Unfortunately, and maybe this is just because I'm a student of human nature or because I've written LARP's before it was painfully obvious that Bishop was a plant because he was basically acting like they had no fear of getting shot by the 40 or so heavily armed criminals in the room, and there decorum suffered for it. For the record I was also in fear of getting shot and it nearly came to that at one point after I attacked the lab coated NPC (both player and character name escape me and for that I apologize) but i decided that the characters hatred of magic and the culture implications of fear for him (Yay Sioux!) over-rode anything I felt about loosing the character.

I've always felt there are two ways you keep people alive in a larp setting. These don't always work because there are people who will want to go kamikaze for reasons both good and bad. However in a campaign where people are actually attached to their characters they stand up well.
1) You impress upon the players that there are immediate and dire consequences if violence breaks out. A dance and dinner at the emperors summer residence or the like where security will pounce before your gun can clear it's holster.
2) You make the NPC's so obscenely powerful that they can't be killed.
It was clear to me that bishop was the latter and reveled in it. Which was cool, but between him and the other super powered spirit also running around and the two possesing ghosts my sense of disbelief was already snapping.

But in the end it didn't matter, hooray for implanted comlinks.

This has turned into a bit more of a rant then I would have liked it. I do want to be clear that I did appreciate the work that went into the LARP and I did have fun but I just spent much of the night feeling pretty powerless and worthless. I can't talk to people because half of them are ultra-powerfull spirits already being monopolized. I can't do anything tech based because it's been reduced to logic puzzles in low light that are also plot bearring so if i were to actually succeed or mess them up I would either kill us all or get rid of our reason for being here "before the appointed time". Unfortunately I can't even follow my usual rule of criticizing nothing unless you offer a fix because I can't think of any way to bring tech users into the larp enviroment well.

[Bull]

To be fair, Bishop was a plant, but he was also playing his legal Mission characters. That character just happens to be broken as all get out. The reason he wasn't that afraid was primarily the Force 8 Greatform Loa he had riding him, which gives him 16 points of hardened armor (Stacked on a bunch of normal armor), or something silly like that, against guns. And 16 counterspelling dice.

We took him down at the Tabletop portion of the game when he finally turned on us and tried to geek our NPC we were protecting, and it was a cast iron bitch to take him down. Lots of Edge and an Assault Cannon came into play.

*grumble*

[LurkerOutThere]

*shrug* I was told that the walls had a "force rediculous" astral ward as well to prevent stuff like that. I didn't pry because i'm a hacker who doesn't know these things, but generally that's what does curb such things in "normal" games.

[BishopMcQ]

Lurker--Yes, I was a plant, but my specific assignment was to screw with Bull's table and I put the group at odds with the entire room until Bull found a way to start making alliances. As Bull mentioned, the character I was playing was a fully legal Missions character that I had played before.

It demonstrated a few things:
1--with a few initiations, Possession mages become very problematic
2--The Demolish series of spells can upset a lot of people. (After casting that, I was shot at by a sniper and someone with an assault rifle)
3--The ward was a good choice for stopping people from leaving, but it didn't keep big nasty things from being called into it.
4--Banishing is very useful.

If the room had made a concerted effort to kill me, they could have. I think in the end it proved that a lot of the players were approaching my character as a head on problem rather than trying to tackle me sideways. Bull's group used a combination of DMSO chemicals, firepower, and multiple attacks to drain away my dodge pool before hitting me with the big one.

The GMs are going through a similar discussion about changes to be made for next year based on feedback from this year. I will make sure that they read through this thread as well, so please, post all your feedback positive or negative so that Aaron can pull it together.

[TranKirsaKali]

I know I just basically organized my team into doing what we could to just get out, and spent time entertaining myself until we could get out. Bishops character I knew was basically at my level magic wise and I had come up with a plan to take him out if it became necessary. Fortunately for me several of the other casters in the room were willing to work with me on many things. Personally he was just entertaining for me to play with. And I did not see a reason to really try and take him out. I do think it would be nice to come up with another way to resolve conflicts though. I didn't feel that I had any way to know if I should boost myself up or what should be used to do so at any given time. As for not walking around afraid of getting shot, I think there were plenty of people like that. I know that really only entered my mind after I destroyed the necklace and lighter Bishop brought to me for destruction. I know he was doing it to cause trouble too. He could have destroyed them just as easily. But hey, I love creating background to give a GM rope and see what they will do with it. Go ahead try to cause my character trouble. (and yes you can see that as a dare! lol ) The only real problem I found in the scramble was the feeling of an arbitrary nature in resolving the conflicts. And dang it! When I cast a spell people are supposed to fall over! Rats n frats n 16 dice for counter spelling. That was the closest I have ever come to fear with Kali!

[LurkerOutThere]

Personally i didn't see the item destruction as a problem as so far as we knew it accomplished our goals rather then really hindering. Would we have preferred to bring them in to our Johnson sure. But we also had enough magical mojo to make the mission work despite the set back so in the end i have money for rent and novacoke next week so it's ok.

Having said that and maybe I'm missing a bit of the humor as i'm just a big dumb newb but:

1)Last i checked Destroy spells don't work like that, even when you overcast them. AFB but I looked it up right after the LARP. Wen't "Huh that's what i figured" and went to bed.
2)I'm glad we could tell a story where a person with operational knowledge of what's going on and out to prove a point about possesion traditions (which lets face it have been a problem for at least two editions now) can basically set out to mess with folks, that's great.