The Sprawl is ALIVE!, The Sprawl as a Mechanically Active NPC Options

[noonesshowmonkey]

So, as the years keep ticking by and gaming time becomes more and more scarce, friends of mine have been turning towards tabletop boardgaming as a great way to spend a few hours together doing (almost) what we do best. Luckily, the advances in tabletop games, their increasing complexity and maturity and incredible diversity has made all of this a winning proposition. From Catan to Battlestar to Descent Into Darkness, we've been feeding the coffers of the creative creators of these tabletop wonders.

Following a series of House on the Haunted Hill games, I've been working on putting together Locations-as-Mechanical-Encounters for Shadowrun. In House on the Haunted Hill, the house itself, its rooms, are NPCs of sorts, acting on the players individually or collectively and spawning various kinds of events (most of which are terrible!). Similar to a complex series of 'random encounter' charts or 'wandering monsters' from early D&D, I am thinking of how this would apply to Shadowrun's Sprawl.

Many of the ideas create reliable, predictable encounters and challenges that allow players to plan for and work around specific kinds of problems. Further, these challenges can spawn a number of new items, services and RP opportunities and provide avenues through which NPCs can reward or provide increased trouble or challenge to a party of PCs.

For example:

• Entering the I-5, the 405 or I-90 - or any large freeway - would involve logging onto GRIDSEC and engaging automatic controls. Players can attempt a hack against [Device Rating X] to gain access to their local GRIDSEC node and spoof special permissions to allow them to drive on manual.
  
  This could produce NPC sold or traded items that would be single-use ROMs to complete this hack on your behalf or even provide bonuses against this kind of hack. Areas in low-security zones would have reduced device ratings, or maybe no checks whatsoever until entering a higher security area.
  
  
• Certain sections of the Sprawl are so heavily populated / trafficked by pedestrians that just getting anyplace in a hurry is damned near impossible. Moving beyond a Crawling rate requires an Athletics check of some kind. All weapons fire is at a large dice pool penalty and will strike bystanders.
  
  Often, I find that encounters boil down to the PCs and their prey. On the battlemat, you have the player characters, the opposition, cover etc., but no / few innocent bystanders. There are a lot of reasons for this, as tracking the innocents is a pain in the ass, there would be a lot of clutter, the list goes on. But, how often have you really had athletics (or any skill) come up in a non-combative encounter? A location like this would allow for a pretty interesting foot chase.
  
  
• Crossing into certain, known (and probably some unknown), high security locations initiates a [Device Rating] scan vs Fake SIN [Rating] threshold. The location requires passersby to log on to a public security network that continuously scans SINs. Players that have their SIN compromised may be allowed an Edge check to retreat the location before a security response occurs. Failing that, players may be allowed to spend an Edge point to avoid the encounter entirely, just skating out in time.
  
  Makes the fake SIN a regular and important portion of the game. Knowing data brokers that can get you a decent fake SIN is a bigger deal. Additionally, a run that requires players to dump a decent SIN can be a big deal. Finding SINs as loot or as rewards turns out to be a big deal.
  
  
• Gang territory actually coming into play. I keep a google-maps version of Seattle with gang controlled areas marked off. A player that enters one that has a beef with them must make an extended Infiltration check to avoid an altercation.
  
  Checks of this kind can create situations, as one of my players has said 'my Tacoma privileges have been revoked.' This can dramatically change the style of play at the table, puts greater emphasis on relationships with NPCs and organizations and rewards good RP. Players that get shaken down by a gang and respond with gunfire can soon find whole sections of the sprawl difficult to do work in.

These are just a few ideas. Do you have some?

[Synner667]

Pretty good.

Always makes me laugh that in the so-called densely packed metropolis, vehicle traffic or people traffic is barely visible.
Oxford Street in London is a river of people during daylight hours, which is what I imagine it to be like in the the future.

[CanRay]

The Sprawl is alive... With the sound of music!

[Hamsnibit]

The second point might be questionable. To create a big commotion people need a destination where they want to travel, a shopping mall, subway station, workplace, or other places where they spend/gain their money and these places are heavily guarded with automated systems and/or security personell.
Poor districts where the majority of the people dwells have poor no none security measures despite people calling the police you still may encounter the local gang who dislike you running around firing automated guns.

Not a long time ago, there was an incident in the news here where certain politicians tried to create a loophole for far reaching automated surveillance as they tried to exept such methods from privacy protection laws.
The protocols for recording and datamining suspicious behaviour already existed in concept which would have been things like running on public places, train stations, govermental building or leaving a bag in crowded places.
This whole idea was to be realized in 10-20 not sure IIRC.

I expect things to be even worse with laws and technical possibilities in SR in Zones with existent (think of B/C+ Zones) security contracts.

[bibliophile20]

• Gang territory actually coming into play. I keep a google-maps version of Seattle with gang controlled areas marked off. A player that enters one that has a beef with them must make an extended Infiltration check to avoid an altercation.
  
  Checks of this kind can create situations, as one of my players has said 'my Tacoma privileges have been revoked.' This can dramatically change the style of play at the table, puts greater emphasis on relationships with NPCs and organizations and rewards good RP. Players that get shaken down by a gang and respond with gunfire can soon find whole sections of the sprawl difficult to do work in.

Ooh. Can I snag a copy of that map?


I've got one idea to add to your pile:

People are creatures of habit; even top operatives will often end up sticking to a few well-scouted routes for travel. Characters have to make a Intuition + Shadowing (Tail Evasion spec) (Security Level Of Neighborhood) Success Test to avoid leaving these "routines" for others to notice and take advantage of. (This would be more for my game, which has lots of downtime; I'd have them make the test when it was necessary, not on a daily basis). Test modifiers would include things like: Positives: vehicle has a spoof chip, more than one fake SIN, Erased quality. Negatives: Dependent quality, Day Job quality, Fame quality, SINner quality. Failure on the test will allow enough information to exist for others to use to predict where and when you might be at certain times--like your commute, having to pick Timmy up from school or day care, and so forth.

[Link]

The Sprawl is alive... With the sound of music!

That should be Shadowbeat's theme song.

showmonkey, interesting idea and scenarios. You might find some inspiration in Sprawl Sites, it has some sprawl encounters sorted by race and archetype amongst other things.

[CanRay]

More music!

[noonesshowmonkey]

I can't seem to find my gang map, which is odd given that it was a google maps overlay. I may have had it on another account or built in the gmaps API. I'll hafta dig around a bit.

A few other ideas:

• The Plastic Jungles - Variable, Edge Based availability with critical successes.
  
  Certain parts of the sprawl, the Plastic Jungles in particular, are well known for being a place where you can buy or sell damned near anything. You never know what you are going to get there, sometimes a VAC is on open auction and other times you can only find only plastic lawn furniture and empty buckets. Players can go there and make an open Edge (plus hits on any applicable dealer knowledge skill) to see what is available. Given GM approval, players may find the craziest shit. Feel free to reward critical successes and glitches with ordinarily hard-to-find items (perhaps with inflated street prices to match) or trouble with the local gangs, respectively.
  
  
• Humanis Turf - meta humans not allowed
  
  Similar to the gang idea earlier, certain chunks of the sprawl can require an Infiltration check or maybe a Charisma based skill challenge to avoid a negative encounter with some meta-haters. Failures could result in anything from a few Lonestar units being sent to see what you are up to (and all the entanglements that can involve) to a few poli-club goons starting a brawl on their turf. Remember, chummer, nobody is gonna break it up and everybody knows it was you and has their camera phone out.
  
  
• ARO-Spam! - going to the electronics mall can be dangerous for your commlink's health.
  
  Players entering large, insecure market areas - say a B or A- rated mall - will be bombarded by Spam and Malware attacks hosted on the less-than-SOTA networks around the mall. Everything but having a Passive commlink, or even just turning it off, will result in having Program Rating X attacks made regularly. Many locations in higher security rated areas will require commlinks on Active mode for SIN scans.

[Midas]

But, how often have you really had athletics (or any skill) come up in a non-combative encounter? A location like this would allow for a pretty interesting foot chase.

I run a noir-style campaign, so I can recommend running chases through urban settings. I kinda abstract it (straight Running opposed test, with the bad guy starting 10m or whatever in front and a subway station 300m away he needs to get to to be home free). Of course you need a setting where the PCs can't just pull out their guns and take the guy down. Try it sometime!

[kzt]

[*] Certain sections of the Sprawl are so heavily populated / trafficked by pedestrians that just getting anyplace in a hurry is damned near impossible. Moving beyond a Crawling rate requires an Athletics check of some kind. All weapons fire is at a large dice pool penalty and will strike bystanders.

A retired NYPD cop talked about the time that his ESU team (in the 80s iirc) had to to literally push their way through rush hour pedestrian traffic. It was NYC, so the pedestrians were pointedly not looking at anyone and just kept going and flowed around the cops. Oh, and the cops were in uniform, with obvious body armor and helmet, and holding shotguns and SMGs at port arms.

[noonesshowmonkey]

I run a noir-style campaign, so I can recommend running chases through urban settings. I kinda abstract it (straight Running opposed test, with the bad guy starting 10m or whatever in front and a subway station 300m away he needs to get to to be home free). Of course you need a setting where the PCs can't just pull out their guns and take the guy down. Try it sometime!

My next game is going to be centered around a Bail Bonds office where the PCs are bailbonds officers / bounty hunters that moonlight in even less-than-legal activities. Basically, their Bail Bonds office is sort of their clubhouse / flophouse where they sometimes earn a bit of legit cred and wait for the next job / woman.