"Get me a blowtorch and a railspike", Shadowrun and Torture Options Track this topic Email this topic Print this topic Download this topic Subscribe to this forum Display Modes Switch to: Outline Standard Switch to: Linear+

[Tziluthi]

Does anybody here have any stories of using torture to interrogate NPCs, or PCs? if so, please share them. And try to keep the troll sodomy to a minimum :).

[Siege]

Truthfully, I've never been in a situation where torture was required.

Granted, I've made some NPCs think I was going to, but I've never, in character, had the need to resort to torture.

-Siege

[Backgammon]

Had one nasty case of intimidation involving the promise of a blowtorch, aided by stepping on a wound, but that's about it. Some of my players once broke some fingers and applied bleach to a guy's face before kiling him, but that's about as bad as it got. It's pretty tought to torture someone. Not many characters have had it in them.

[Kagetenshi]

I know it's taking the easy way out, but if you've got the mojo to sling without drain, a combination of high-force Agony and Chaos can make anyone's life a living hell. It also works well when there's an onlooker; when the nine-foot Troll is writhing on the ground screaming and retching up anything in his stomach, are you going to keep your mouth shut when the man asks you a question?

~J

[Mana Child]

Lol i suppose torture could work but as you say not many characters tend to want to do it in any rpg (me talking from dnd experience but the theme and message is the same)

[Lindt]

Hmmm the ways of magical torture? I like the sound of that.

[Kagetenshi]

Hot potato and a piece of metal illusioned to look like it's glowing hot can really make people question their sanity after a few days without sleep. Put it in their hand, force their hand closed (though leave LOS somehow), wait for sufficient pain, then take it away. If you're quick, cast an illusion of horrible burns and then drop it when they aren't paying attention.

I get these ideas randomly, so I'll probably be making a lot of short posts.

~J

[LoseAsDirected]

The first game I was ever in ended with the troll biting the fingers off of this corper dude, one by one by one... It was rather funny... That was 7 years ago..

*sigh*

[toturi]

My PCs do it the old fashion way... serious stun damage. If the guy is seriously stunned, his Willpower roll should fail.

[Fortune]

Who needs torture when they have Mind Probe?

[toturi]

Mind Probe works better with torture.

Actually everything goes better with torture.

[Kagetenshi]

More ideas:

Keep someone for a few months, sustained solely through periodically-recast Nutrition spells. The spell specifically states that it doesn't relieve feelings of hunger or thirst, just the actual need.

Keep someone in a totally dark room. Every so often cast Flash in. Staple eyelids open if required.

Foreboding on a room with the prisoner. Leave them in there for a few weeks. Make sure you take them out to question before they crack completely.

~J

Edit: Fortune, you're missing the point. Mind Probe is less satisfying.

[Fortune]

[Kagetenshi]

Repeated Alter Memory spells... actually, this one works better if the person isn't a captive. Sneak in at night, cast, have them deal with the altered memories the next day ("But you said he was a Fuchi suit so it was okay for me to bring my deck!" "I told you specifically that he was Renraku and not to bring anything with Fuchi's label anywhere near the meet."). Continue until life is destroyed.

~J

[BitBasher]

Problem is torture doesn't work. It is completely unreliale. people in pain will tell you whatever they think you want to hear, even if they have to make ut up, just to get the pain to stop. Or by the time they tell you the real answer they have told you so many lies trying to get you to stop you have no idea what the truth is.

[Tziluthi]

Er, I think most people will drop the cunning routine as soon as the prospect of their face getting burnt off comes up.

Oh yeah, and the first person who can guess the movie reference from the topic title gets a cookie.

[Kagetenshi]

Again, it doesn't matter what the person you're doing it to tells you. The person you ask questions is the person being tortured's partner who is watching it all.

~J

[PuyallupSquatter]

Enie Menie Miney Moe, where can my rubber glove possibly go?

One of my players built a torturer right out of the gate. Her backstory was she was a chemestry student at the UW, and ended up having to run the shadows before the Tuition Monster ate her. (alot more to it, but for the sake of simplicity...) She took alot of knowledge skills in things like Herbal Intoxicants, hallucinagenic chemical compounds, stuff like that. Mind Probe is fun (almost as fun as anal probe), but tying someone to a chair and slowly brainfragging them does have its entertaining qualities.

I think the sick part is that she went the voodoo path and picked Ghede as her totem. Can you guess where her sense of humor kicks in?

[Kagetenshi]

If you've got karma to burn, Quicken a high-force Chaos spell on someone and release them in downtown Seattle. There's always the possibility that someone will realize what's going on before the person gets themselves killed, but the odds are very much not in their favour...

Note: even better if you tell them beforehand.

~J

[Foreigner]

You know, this thread reminds me of something I read once. I stumbled across it while surfing the Web, but unfortunately I can't remember where it was.

Group of PCs--a racist, nationalistic Elf Adept/assassin, a Human Adept, and an Ork Streetsam, IIRC, although how a racist Elf from Tir Tairngire (I think) ended up on a runner team which wasn't composed entirely of Elves is beyond me-- were paid by a corporate type to grab an NPC researcher from a rival corp and put the squeeze on him for some information on his employer's latest secret project.

The scene opens with the researcher waking up after being kidnapped (the ol' Narcoject pistol loaded with Gamma Scopolamine gag, I think), and discovering that he's in a hotel room, tied to a chair, with three very nasty-looking Shadowrunners looking him over like a pride of lions on a fresh kill.

Adept: "We know who you are, where you work, and all about the top-secret project you're working on. Our employer wants us to find out all we can about that project. Now will you tell us willingly, or do we have to employ special methods to get what we want?"

Researcher: "I can't! If I told you anything, I'd lose my job!"

Anyway, it went on in this vein for several more minutes real time before the player playing the Human Adept turned to the guy playing the Elven Adept/assassin and said (with a straight face):

"Ert, get out the genital press....".

The GM was so impressed by their improvisational skills that he decided that the NPC researcher had suddenly become VERY cooperative (not to mention scared half to death :)), and decided to tell the 'runners what they wanted to know.

It ended with the following footnote:

"To this day, none of us knows what a genital press is, or even what one looks like--and we're not exactly certain that we want to find out."

:D


--Foreigner

[Crimzero]

[Zazen]

One of my players is a troll with high skills in Sodomy, Torture, Chemistry, Painful Dick Piercings, and some other stuff that I can't recall. He likes to pierce them with his cyberhorn to dose them with the hyper in its venom sac before he starts widening holes. He's come up with some pretty funny routines, including "always reward good struggling with cookies".

Then again my current game is quite silly.

[Siege]

Given enough motivation or incentive, torture is easy.

The question becomes -- what is sufficient motivation for you?

-Siege

[Siege]

[sidartha]

Remember kids. gamma-scopalimine is a truth serum. ;)