Slaughter ahappening, 15 notierity on the 2nd run? Options

[GM Lich]

Hi, I am a fairly new to GMing the world to shadowrun. However somehow, things don't feel quite right. We started with 2 players, it was pretty good. Then 2 new players wished to join. Ok sounds good so far. I give him the book and the excel spreadsheet from this wonderful forum, I tell themselves to knock themselves out. The next week the 2 chars arrive, I give them the run to infiltrate a facility retrieve, a weaken cyberzombie. They inflitrate the facility, using mostly kill anything that moves but stealthily tactic. Now for the part where things get ugly, they peak into the next room. Oh lookie a room with 16 researchers, 12 turrets, and 6 guards. Guess what the runners do? They throw in 6 high explosive grenades. BOOM! Nothing remains expect.... Er... one really lucky researcher, who is in shock. The support mage stabilizes and heals him. The PCs then began torturing the researcher then kill him. an unarmed researcher. The rest of the mission goes quite well, however near the end, when they are running away via motorcycles, our dwarf with the logic of 1 (yes the new PCs seem to be min maxers) decides its a good idea to donate 15 pounds of commerical explosives in the warehouse. 10 inocents die who live newby. So its the end of the game, guess what all players get 15 notoriety for the act of slaughter, and the dwarf gets 25. Is it just me, or do I find this ridiculous? So I have decided to most likely retribution is at hand, and advice? I personally would not like this to turn into a slaughter innocents campaign.

[Khyron]

Yeah, the players need to know there are always consequences.

Their Johnson anonymously alerts the local Star/Knight Errant in fear of being caught up in that fiasco and their next Johnson recognizes them and doesn't want anything to do with people as.. noticeable.. I doubt their fixers want anything to do with murderous lunatics because they'll bring the heat down on them too. Then there are the family members and widows and whatnot that could hire other runner teams out for revenge.

[Chrysalis]

A Mr Johnson hires them to break into a partially dismantled R&D facility. Using the groups noteriety to his advantage the R&D head of the facility (Mr. Johnson), needs to blame someone else for the death of all 50 research subjects during the testing of a new drug. If he does not his project is going to be discontinued and he is going to be without a job.

[Kumo]

You never know what to expect with new players... Probably they want to feel "superiority". So don't be afraid and just kick their asses, like Khyron said (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif) . After that, if nobody will be willing to do biz with them, their only choice will be to take really ugly or dangerous jobs - and very cheaply. New employer can even install cortex bombs in their brains. "Friendly" contacts or runners may warn their next targets. Or maybe corp owner of destroyed facility will send them on suicidal mission.

[Cardul]

There is a certain etiquette in the Shadows. I know that in my groups, in the past, I have described the results of runs like that, and their response was "Let's hunt 'em down!" Not even the most flamboyant player I have ever had would
have tolerated that...

Prime Runners coming after these guys for their "crimes against the reputationj of Shadowrunners" is very much
what I would expect!

[hobgoblin]

donate 15 pounds of commerical explosives in the warehouse. 10 inocents die who live newby.

even with fragmenting walls, that sounds like a gm being colorful with the explosives result, rather then going with the rules...

[toturi]

So its the end of the game, guess what all players get 15 notoriety for the act of slaughter, and the dwarf gets 25. Is it just me, or do I find this ridiculous? So I have decided to most likely retribution is at hand, and advice? I personally would not like this to turn into a slaughter innocents campaign.

How are you figuring the 15 points of notoriety? I am not saying you are wrong, it is your game but I'd like to know if it is just something you simply decided on or is there a rule I missed.

[Twilights_Herald]

I thought you weren't really supposed to rack up notoriety for doing the same types of things over and over unless you manage to get creative about it. This is probably worth about four or five, IMHO, which is pretty extreme already for a single run that didn't kill a beloved Great Dragon President.

[Traul]

Maybe you should talk this out with your players. Do they just like to kill stuff, or did they believe it to be an proper way of playing a criminal?

[Warlordtheft]

I thought you weren't really supposed to rack up notoriety for doing the same types of things over and over unless you manage to get creative about it. This is probably worth about four or five, IMHO, which is pretty extreme already for a single run that didn't kill a beloved Great Dragon President.

I'll agree with this, as you should probably treat the whole thing as one event. Also, with so much carnage, the heat should be on the players unless someone cast sterilize at the scene of the crime.

[Kumo]

Maybe 15/25 points of Notoriety is too much, but at least 5 should be given. Killing everything on the way + killing innocent people + mass murder + tortures + blowing up some more innocents "because I want to" + stupidity (making corpsec REALLY anger)... Each way, nearly 100% of PCs' Rep is negative.

[Krypter]

Simple: those guys have stepped from the category of "shadowrunners" and straight into the category of "wanted terrorists". Appropriate SWAT, FBI, Joint Counter-Terrorism and Commando Strike Team responses will follow. No shadowrunner, contact or fixer will touch them, and I don't give them more than a week on the run.

[Screaming Eagle]

Wow... just wow.

An idea to obey the rule of awesome:
One of the security guards is rushed to hospital and resesitated only to die in front of his family hours later. He was 3 days from retiremant. His old beatcop partner (they were both drummed out of the force for not adhering to procedure, but the partner got back in to the police force for "extereme merit" and his relative youth) swears vengance "on those animals" The movies hero... I mean the old partner proceeds to begin breaking ever rule in the book in his quest, has to resign the force before he is fired and jepordise his love life... I think you get the idea - make sure the Runners find out their nemisis has a signifigant other too... see if they spiral down further or realise they have already F-d up hard and they shouldn't make it worse by taking away his reason to live.

Basically proceed to toss a action movie hero ala. Die Hard, Leathal Weapon etc. al. at the offenders. Build him as a top of the line prime runner and I myself would try to limit and cyber or magic, just make him Ultra Bad Ass, probably a cyberhand or something, he's got a lighter, whiskey flask and smokes stored in it. Unless they left no evidence of thier identities they will get a "shoot to kill" order unofficaly sent out for them.
And I agree: their regular contacts should start drying up and those that stick with them start getting harrassed with signifigant predudice by a Bruce Willis look alike.
As for the mechanincal noterioty I'd be inclined to toss about 6 at them. Cause seriously. Large bonus to intimidate? Yessir! Large penalty to EVERYTHING ELSE - yessir. 15 makes them too famous, this is just one attocity. You've got to do a few of these to get really up there.

EDIT - for referance I don't use the Mechanics in the book for Fame and Infamy - I just eyeball it.
EDIT2 - Isn't demolitions logic based?

[Screaming Eagle]

Simple: those guys have stepped from the category of "shadowrunners" and straight into the category of "wanted terrorists". Appropriate SWAT, FBI, Joint Counter-Terrorism and Commando Strike Team responses will follow. No shadowrunner, contact or fixer will touch them, and I don't give them more than a week on the run.

Quick note:
This is the gritty way to do it, and proably the more realistic one by a couple of orders of magnitude. Depends on the kind of game you want though.

[Paul]

To me this sounds like an OOC communication issue.

Are you having fun? If the answer is yes then don't do anything different. If the answer is no, then it's time to take a look at how things are working.

Remember this as the GM you do agree to help everyone else have fun, but not at the expense of you having no fun at all. (Some sacrifice comes with the job omae, it's a dirty game but don't hate the players right?) Sit down and talk to your players. Explain what you see-I'd recommend not being a dick about it, since most people when confroted with their own douche-bag-ness will deny, deny, deny and deny. Especially if it happens in scenario they feel the need to save face.

When I hit this wall, I ask questions. I put the burden on them. "Hey guys before we game tonight I want to make sure we're all having fun, so I have a few questions." Remember with out a group it's an MMORPG, and I'm sure we can all agree that's second best.

After asking a few questions let it drop. "Well you guys did this, and the way I see it in the real world this would happen. What do you think would happen?" Gauge their response, and go from there.

[Brazilian_Shinob...]

I have to remember to bookmark this thread and show it to a friend of mine whom believes that shadowrun is all about killing everything it is put in front of you.

[Paul]

Everyone's different. I tend to take more a "Caper Film" feel to mine, with a real dark emphasis. Bad things happen to good people in my games, and the players aren't necessarily "White Knights" either. Sometimes they are the problem. But the game is about having fun as I understand it, and everyone does that differently, right?

[StealthSigma]

EDIT2 - Isn't demolitions logic based?

Yes, which is what makes the Log 1 dwarf all the more awesome.

I agree the entire situation is ridiculous, but it is still funny. Maybe I just have a messed up perception on life.

[kzt]

I don't know, this seems like a good introduction to the shadows to me.....

There are two paths to the team. One via the Johnson, the other direct.

The Johnson is probably screwed. When they watch the surveillance video they should be able put together the list of who would be interested in this project and who would have had the right amount of information. At which point Mr. Johnson is likely to get a visit. He'll roll over on the fixer. Who will give up the team.

So even if the players did a perfectly clean job and left nothing behind that leads to them, they are likely going to get rolled up anyhow. And it's likely that there is a path that leads right to them because they sound sloppy. So then they roll over on the fixer.

So if I were the fixer I'd probably want to get someone good to waste the Johnson and the team, then skip town for a few weeks/months and have my other contacts see if anyone from the Joint Terrorism Strike Force starts asking for me by name. Or be the informer who gets to walk after he turns in the Johnson and the team.

So if I was the team I'd waste the fixer ASAP, as the Johnson probably doesn't have nearly as much info on you as the fixer does. Then kill the Johnson.

Of course, if I was the Johnson I'd want the team dead. I probably wouldn't think to go after the fixer.

And with the large anonymous reward, all their "buddies" in town will want to turn the players into the feds.

See, this is a great introduction to the Shadows.

[Brazilian_Shinob...]

I don't know, this seems like a good introduction to the shadows to me.....

There are two paths to the team. One via the Johnson, the other direct.

The Johnson is probably screwed. When they watch the surveillance video they should be able put together the list of who would be interested in this project and who would have had the right amount of information. At which point Mr. Johnson is likely to get a visit. He'll roll over on the fixer. Who will give up the team.

So even if the players did a perfectly clean job and left nothing behind that leads to them, they are likely going to get rolled up anyhow. And it's likely that there is a path that leads right to them because they sound sloppy. So then they roll over on the fixer.

So if I were the fixer I'd probably want to get someone good to waste the Johnson and the team, then skip town for a few weeks/months and have my other contacts see if anyone from the Joint Terrorism Strike Force starts asking for me by name. Or be the informer who gets to walk after he turns in the Johnson and the team.

So if I was the team I'd waste the fixer ASAP, as the Johnson probably doesn't have nearly as much info on you as the fixer does. Then kill the Johnson.

Of course, if I was the Johnson I'd want the team dead. I probably wouldn't think to go after the fixer.

And with the large anonymous reward, all their "buddies" in town will want to turn the players into the feds.

See, this is a great introduction to the Shadows.

LOL!
Shadowrun teacher: "So kids, what have we learned today after watching the security tapes of this FUBAR run?"
Class: "That a high body count is bad for business and your life Mrs. Anderson."
Shadowrun teacher: "Good, good! And what else?"
Class: "Never trust high yield explosives to a meta-human who can't count his toes."
Shadowrun teacher: "Great! Class dismissed!"

[hobgoblin]

I have to remember to bookmark this thread and show it to a friend of mine whom believes that shadowrun is all about killing everything it is put in front of you.

err, i thought that was the point of that "other" game...

[deek]

15/25 Notoriety seems awfully high. A couple points are more in line with RAW. With that high of Notoriety, it may be tough to ever get a job again.

As to the actual run, if the Johnson didn't give any parameters for the run, then I can't really blame the runners on this one. I know that after running enough games, I make sure the runners know if there are special objectives, like staying unseen, zero body count, do A before B, etc.

Seeing they had enough time to heal then torture the lone researcher without backup come to clean up the mess, I'd say you, the GM, were kind of late in showing the players in-game what they should and shouldn't be allowed to do. You let them run amok without consequences. I see two things you can do to salvage this:

1) Change the focus of the game to allow them to do these types of runs regularly.
2) Mark it down as a learning experience and work on creating future runs with more objectives to keep these actions in check (assuming you don't like the way this first run went).

[Screaming Eagle]

err, i thought that was the point of that "other" game...

Paranioa?
Kobolds Ate My Baby?

Oh oh! Wolfenstien

[pbangarth]

Oh oh! Wolfenstien

Yeah, this sounds like these guys played a few too many video games.

[Adarael]

15/25 notoriety is excessive. 15/25 notoriety means that - for the general runners - no one will hire them for anything, ever. They cannot roll any dice on any social rolls except intimidation. And most importantly, every single person they see on the street will recognize them. Now, that may be appropriate, given the circumstances and how you see the Shadowrun game world. But basically what you have done is say, "Your PCs are now unplayable.