Night at the Museum, When a simple B&E goes horribly wrong Options

[Doc Chase]

Setting up an escape game for the two isn't a terribad idea, but remember that they're both in isolation in a supermax security facility that may or may not publically exist.

Now, if you want them to stage a prison riotonce they're released into the general population and make a daring escape like something out of Face/Off, go crazy. It'd be a wonderful pink-mohawk capstone to their incarceration, and makes you look even cooler as a GM ("Sure, I totally planned all that") as it would cater to both of their strengths and provide sufficient challenge to make them think.

Make 'em work hard for it.

[suoq]

I've not watched Burn Notice, but Leverage (which I love) is a modern day Utopian (rather than Dystopian) Shadowrun. I think that's why I like it so much. For the Shadowrun aspect, not the Utopian.

The problem is, if you're playing a Dystopian game, and "about 20 museum guards and 15 SWAT members are either dead or severely wounded" why the heck are you even taking these two runners to jail?

The only reason I can think that these two people aren't sewer rat feed is that someone high up has a need for a small (expandable) team that can do that kind of damage and he made sure that the team members (read "future hostages") weren't just shot dead on the spot.

Dead would have believable and quicker. They're alive. There needs to be a reason why.

[Doc Chase]

Easy enough: The vase that was stolen needs to be recovered. The two are going to be held and tortured until they give up the information, or until the supervisor gets bored/frustrated and brings a mage in to mindrape the both of them. While the K-E crash team goes after the mage and the sammie, the hacker and the face now have the opportunity for a daring escape.

Provided they have the stones for it.

If not, they're going to be used to get the vase back, lull the team into a false sense of security, then all four of 'em are gonna die in a hail of 100% Amurrican firepower.

[Abstruse]

Maybe I'm a bit of a dick, but IMO, you run around killing cops when you're in a siege situation, there's a very good chance you'll get two to the back of the head while "trying to escape"...especially with a bodycount like that. Frankly, I'd let them hang just to prove a point to the players. If you reward them with a daring escape, they'll just keep run around like they're playing an FPS in god mode.

Unless you like running a game of sociopaths, that is...to each their own.

[Warlordtheft]

Pink Mohawk version: Give the hacker and face time in lockdown. Until something horribly goes wrong and the inmates riot (Latent technomancer/rogue AI). THe plan is for them to escape, but they are now hung out to dry, have criminal sins, and have lost everything (Mind probes are great as are BTL interrogation methods).

The Sam and mage are wanted, hung out to dry, and have enemies KE at the max incidence level (hopefully one of them will have a safe house that neither the hacker or face knows about. Otherwise they will have to burn their current SIN and get a new one.

Mirrored shades version: Give the hacker and face some interrogation time (use of BTLs with fake escapes and other tricks to find the other PCs). Set up an ambush at some point, spring the trap, and have everyone make new PCs.


IMHO:Their mistake was not doing this more quiet like-guard disguises/illusions, stealth and con. That, and not figuring out why the Johnson wanted it leathal.

[Tanegar]

I may regret this, but I have to ask: why did they mutilate the guards' bodies?

[sabs]

I may regret this, but I have to ask: why did they mutilate the guards' bodies?

I'm guessing to loot cyberware to sell.

[EuroShadow]

I may add that it may depend how good the runner street cred is. If it is their first run, then just let those 2 dies. But if its 20th run, and they have some recognition in shadows, then maybe there is some hope. However, the lesson should still be harsh. Have someone trustable approach the two free persons and offer help. But it is shadows: help comes with large price tag (The money they have +50k) and they have to risk their own skins. This is the point where good street cred may pay off, and maybe lesson could be sufficiently harsh with much money spent, going into debt, and then risking (and maybe even burning some edge points) in running away mission. It also may go to show that what can you not solve with money, you can solve with a lot of money (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Shinobi Killfist]

Just curious what went wrong for them?

It sounds like they scouted things out(leg work) came up with a good plan, and other than being psycho executed the plan well. If they got caught mainly due to GM fiat I'd be more inclined to let them escape. If they screwed up I'd be more inclinedtot have them die in jail.

[CanRay]

Death is light as a feather. Bubba the Love Troll is heavier than mountains.

[Elfenlied]

Pink Mohawk version: Give the hacker and face time in lockdown. Until something horribly goes wrong and the inmates riot (Latent technomancer/rogue AI). THe plan is for them to escape, but they are now hung out to dry, have criminal sins, and have lost everything (Mind probes are great as are BTL interrogation methods).

The Sam and mage are wanted, hung out to dry, and have enemies KE at the max incidence level (hopefully one of them will have a safe house that neither the hacker or face knows about. Otherwise they will have to burn their current SIN and get a new one.

Mirrored shades version: Give the hacker and face some interrogation time (use of BTLs with fake escapes and other tricks to find the other PCs). Set up an ambush at some point, spring the trap, and have everyone make new PCs.


IMHO:Their mistake was not doing this more quiet like-guard disguises/illusions, stealth and con. That, and not figuring out why the Johnson wanted it leathal.

Well, our games tend to be somewhere in between, perhaps leaning slightly more towards pink mohawk. Maybe a mix of the two options will work out for me. I was thinking about Mind Probing the two of them, implanting both of them with a Judas persona (see RC for details) and Cortex bombs, and send them on a mission to retrieve the artifact from Atzlan territory.

I may regret this, but I have to ask: why did they mutilate the guards' bodies?

Don't know whether you'll regret it, but here's it: they did it for the heck of it. Otherwise, I couldn't possibly explain how one could behead a corpse and place the head in a showcase, remove the pants from another corpse, and place the first corpse with the neck stump in the second corpse's exposed rear.

Death is light as a feather. Bubba the Love Troll is heavier than mountains.

Kudos for quoting Robert Jordan. I simply love Wheel of Time! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/love.gif)
Unfortunately, we agreed that there will be no surprise intercourse in our games as long as the player characters don't start it.

Just curious what went wrong for them?

It sounds like they scouted things out(leg work) came up with a good plan, and other than being psycho executed the plan well. If they got caught mainly due to GM fiat I'd be more inclined to let them escape. If they screwed up I'd be more inclinedtot have them die in jail.

The alarm was triggered by DM fiat, that's why I'm going out of my way to try and find a plausible reason of letting them get out alive.

[Notsoevildm]

Pink Mohawk version: Give the hacker and face time in lockdown. Until something horribly goes wrong and the inmates riot (Latent technomancer/rogue AI). THe plan is for them to escape, but they are now hung out to dry, have criminal sins, and have lost everything (Mind probes are great as are BTL interrogation methods).

The Sam and mage are wanted, hung out to dry, and have enemies KE at the max incidence level (hopefully one of them will have a safe house that neither the hacker or face knows about. Otherwise they will have to burn their current SIN and get a new one.

This sounds suitably Shadowrun. There are always consequences. If you want to be particularly nasty, the hacker and face should also have to permanently burn a point of karma pool / edge if they want to keep these characters.

[Irion]

Don't know whether you'll regret it, but here's it: they did it for the heck of it. Otherwise, I couldn't possibly explain how one could behead a corpse and place the head in a showcase, remove the pants from another corpse, and place the first corpse with the neck stump in the second corpse's exposed rear.

Get help. Professional help.

The alarm was triggered by DM fiat, that's why I'm going out of my way to try and find a plausible reason of letting them get out alive.

Well, what means triggered by DM fiat? Was it in the books, was it reasonable?
Sorry, but if you run around shouting peoble in AAA alarm is nearly impossible to be DM fiat.
I mean, look at the freaking cheap sensors and programms you can use. It aint a problem to detect gunfire in a house.
(Thats why guns are bad. Tasers, squirtguns, Stunbolts are nice.)

[Elfenlied]

Well, what means triggered by DM fiat? Was it in the books, was it reasonable?
Sorry, but if you run around shouting peoble in AAA alarm is nearly impossible to be DM fiat.
I mean, look at the freaking cheap sensors and programms you can use. It aint a problem to detect gunfire in a house.
(Thats why guns are bad. Tasers, squirtguns, Stunbolts are nice.)

Well, a third party entered the stage, killed their technomancer npc who accompanied them on the mission, and manually triggered the alarm. The only reason why it wasn't triggered earlier is because they managed to infiltrate the central security hub, and replace the spider with their npc. That way, he was able to rig the camera feed and disable all the biomonitors slaved to the nexus.

[CeeJay]

Don't know whether you'll regret it, but here's it: they did it for the heck of it. Otherwise, I couldn't possibly explain how one could behead a corpse and place the head in a showcase, remove the pants from another corpse, and place the first corpse with the neck stump in the second corpse's exposed rear.

Ugh! Somehow that reminds me of Hancock... But if that's your players humor, I say they deserve a day or two in a cell with Bubba the Love Troll... (IMG:style_emoticons/default/ork.gif)

-CJ

[Elfenlied]

Ugh! Somehow that reminds me of Hancock... But if that's your players humor, I say they deserve a day or two in a cell with Bubba the Love Troll... (IMG:style_emoticons/default/ork.gif)

-CJ

The characters in question are good looking women (one of them's a dryad), so Bubba wouldn't be as hilarious as usual.

[Inpu]

There's an old rule about leaving NPCs alone, so I wouldn't really call that GM fiat. Especially if they had a hacker.

[Irion]

@Elfenlied
So it was not GM fiat, it was part of the run.

Because if you break it down: Not getting hit by a car would be already GM fiat. (Make an Edge roll. *critical glitch* make an agility roll *glitch* "Well you got hit by a fucking bus for *roll* 10K. There are games working like that. But Shadowrun ain't one of them.)
So just following through the run can not be GM fiat, as far as I am concerned.

GM fiat would have been if they had seen it coming and acted accordingly. Guarding the TM, not killing anyone exept the ones who tried to kill the TM and the alarm would have been set of anyway. (And the guards they knocked out would have got shot, even if the hid the Bodys)

That would have been
GM fiat. But fucking up a run is not.

[CanRay]

The characters in question are good looking women (one of them's a dryad), so Bubba wouldn't be as hilarious as usual.

Bubba has a Sister that's in the Female Prison, also named Bubba.

As for the "Duty is heavier than a mountain, death lighter than a feather" statement, it's a Japanese proverb that was just quoted by Robert Jordan, not something that originated from him.

[Warlordtheft]

I think it boils down to weather you as GM felt there was a resonable chance for the PCs to prevent the NPC's death and thereby prevent an alarm.

(You mean they didn't even leave the NPC a spirit to protect him?)

[Shinobi Killfist]

I think it boils down to weather you as GM felt there was a resonable chance for the PCs to prevent the NPC's death and thereby prevent an alarm.

(You mean they didn't even leave the NPC a spirit to protect him?)

So, you have the guards handled in an empty museum at night. And you are leaving a spirit which costs nuyen to bind with the technomancer because you think what someone else will be robbing the museum at the same time?

I'm going to agree that this was a bit of GM fiat going.

Side note : I'm not a big fan of Bubba the love troll incidents in any case because to me they are just GM fiat. If you want to run my character, I'll hand him over. And putting me in situation where I have absolutely no effective way to change the outcome is the basically the same thing. So once we are done with story telling mode, let me know when I get to play my character again.

I think since the players have seen the mystic map there is a plausible reason for the Johnson to become involved in this. His two choices would be to kill the players in Jail or to free them. Lonestar is a corp and they can be bought, have the Johnson through a fixer buy them an early release with some restrictions like a cortex bomb. I would not actually screw them over with the bomb, I'd play it straight and free them of the bomb when the next run was complete. It is movie plausible in the sense that the players have a lot of the cards here, they have the vase, they have seen the map on the vase, chances are who ever is involved in this wants that info.

Heck maybe the second party that triggered this mess frees them since the Sam gives the vase to the Johnson and they need the information of what the players saw so they can anticipate the Johnsons next move.

[Inpu]

So, you have the guards handled in an empty museum at night. And you are leaving a spirit which costs nuyen to bind with the technomancer because you think what someone else will be robbing the museum at the same time?

I'm going to agree that this was a bit of GM fiat going.

No, I'd leave a guy in the meat to watch over him, have the Hacker keep an AR screen up to the node the TM is in so he can jump in if trouble starts. Leaving someone undefended is asking for it. Totally not GM fiat. It's the old rule: players that separate from the group are easy prey for random events.

[Shinobi Killfist]

No, I'd leave a guy in the meat to watch over him, have the Hacker keep an AR screen up to the node the TM is in so he can jump in if trouble starts. Leaving someone undefended is asking for it. Totally not GM fiat. It's the old rule: players that separate from the group are easy prey for random events.

Sop Gm Fiat then. You aren't guarding him because it makes sense, you are guarding him because you are gaming the system and expecting GM fiat.

[Doc Chase]

Considering the TM was the spider at the time and didn't detect the intrusion, I would lean towards 'GM Fiat' as well to his untimely demise and the alarm activation.

However, the ensuing gunfight and previous mutilation of the guards is the team's own damn fault. If their tacnet encryption code wasn't 'IDKFA' or 'IDDQD' then this wouldn't be as icky as it is.

[Inpu]

Sop Gm Fiat then. You aren't guarding him because it makes sense, you are guarding him because you are gaming the system and expecting GM fiat.

I think it would make perfect sense to guard the fellow who holds sway over the building security while you are in the building, don't you? Because if something happens to him, at all, then the Run goes bust. Which makes it a weakness in the Run. Which means it should be accounted for and guarded to the best of the team's ability while still achieving mission parameters.

I wouldn't expect GM Fiat. I expect reasonable risk. If you don't guard the corner stone of the mission, then you risk losing it.