OOC: A Short Victorius War, A Living in the Shadows game Options

[WinterRat1]

I"ll have Dragon warn Erebus. You'll know he's there.

[banditf50]

Winterrat: We do not know if the enemy mage (who is an iniiate) is going to go before or after Virgil. We also do not know if Virgil will suddenely be afflicted my another strange magical restriction. If you throw the smoke you may obscure Virgi's vision, but you also obscure the vision of the enemy mage.

Just a thought . . . I'm trying to be a bit conservative. . .perhaps too conservative so please say something to straighten me out if need be.

[Cedric Rolfsson]

WinterRat1, which way is Dragon headed, for his shotgun or towards the bad guys? If Dragon were to run for the corner of the building in yellow on the same side of the street as the bar that would give him almost complete cover from Goon 3(who would be around the corner of the same building) and good cover from Goon 1 and the mage and give him a decent angle on Goon 2. Erebus would have cover from Goon 2 and could engage Goon 3 (once Erebus knows he's there of course.)

Depending upon BC's ruling as to how much cover you had you might be out of the mage's LOS which would limit their magical support's effectiveness. You wouldn't have your shotgun but you'd be in better range for pistol work, you'd be moving away from ground zero, and we could have the main OppFor in a cross fire by the second or third initiative pass.

Also, Dragon might be able to see if there is a second strike team waiting behind the bar looking for us to come out the back, and thus warn Tenmou and Daedalus. I'm not sure about that because the map is a little rough but by looking at the map you'd at least have a chance to see if there is more than one strike team out there.

[bclements]

EDIT: Sorry about that. Grenades go off in your next combat phase. If you don't have any more combat phases, it goes off at the end of the next initiative pass. If it's at the last initiative pass, the grenade detonates at the end of the combat turn (P118)

WR1: Post Dragon's strength when/if you throw, so I can get the TN

Bandit: Virgil won't have a modifier by moving, but he's looking out of the doorway. So if he moves back in the bar, he'll loose LoS on the attackers.

[WinterRat1]

I seem to be getting the most votes for 'towards the bad guys'. Sigh. That's it, pistols skill is going up. Every freaking time I've been in a fight, all I've had are pistols. I'm on the verge of not going anywhere anymore without my shotgun in a bag or something. Seriously.

BC- If I took Cedric's idea and tried to go for the yellow building Goon 3 is by, would I be adequately away from the missile? I.e. how far is the building from the bar? That'll probably be the major factor in going for the shotgun or on the offensive right away, how far I can get from the missile.

As far as the grenade: aerodynamic HE offensive (I believe, not sure about the HE part, almost sure it is though), and Dragon's strength is 6.

Team- Long story short, I will go for the offensive per Cedric's plan if I can get away from the missile by being in that position (or at least reasonably far, I need to know distances first). Otherwise, I'm going for the shotgun first, mostly because it isn't these three that worry me; between grenade, spell, and autofire from the sky, they shouldn't be a problem. It's anyone else out there that's got me worried, and I want to be adequately prepared for the second wave. I'm going with the assumption that there is more than one group out there, since this makes three times they've tangled with us now and I'm pretty sure they are going to be ready to throw the kitchen sink at us this time around.

Oh, and if we could take one of them alive, that'd probably be really helpful too. But if we can't, I'm not exactly picky about it.

[Tiredronin]

just a minor note, that rigger is probably out there, which means we should be expected at least the one blimp with the missiles... and if I were him/her, I'd have a few more of those gun blimps (the ones with the SMGs) floating around too..

do note that these blimps are pretty hard to spot (until the fire) and ARMORED. Depending on their placement they can seriously compromise any cover you guys have.

I'll do what I can to deal with this but do be aware, my only flying drone with a gun is loaded with an MMG, nothing explosive. (the other drones are supposed to be part of that packaged that Vinnie fumbled) : (

hence the possibility of taking the fight indoors where they may have less of a tactical advantage (pending the fact that we can conjure up a way out)

[Cedric Rolfsson]

BC are we ready to go yet? Is everyone waiting on me to post my first pass? If so I apologize, I'm tracking like four different dumpshock threads right now in addition to work and I'm not as on top of all of them as I should be, sorry.

Let me know if I'm supposed to post and I'll get that up today.

Edit: Ronin just reviewed your post, only problem with going indoors is that we have zero defensive depth and would have no room to move. The OppFor obviously has logistical support that we don't, they've chosen the battle ground, and they initiated the conflict. I prefer a running fight where we can break out of the box that I assume we're in to a static defense.

[Tiredronin]

coincidentially, BC, how many people are in this bar?

[bclements]

Busy at work today; give me till this evening and I'll get the to y'alls questions up.

[Tiredronin]

I agree that getting locked in is not a good idea, but they have cards that we may not know about.

Now before I go on, I guess it would be unrealistic for us to be able to coordinate like this, but for the sake of discussion I wanted to throw this out

How about something like retreating back so we don't get stuck in any crossfires, and rounding up the bar patrons and evacuating them out the back (read: moving cover).

this is dependant on a few assumptions:
1. there is a back
2. there are enough bar patrons to cover our movment
3. the OppFor (finally figured out what that ment :D) does not have some horrific ambush waiting out back
4. the OppFor is not willing to butcher random innocent civillians

They are more prepared, its just a matter of figuring out what they are prepared for. What would they assume we would do, and how can we catch them off guard.

GMs: if you think this type of discussion is inappropriate (esp for the lenght of time it takes for a missle to fly), please let me know, I'm just throwing this out. Ultimately it could just have been a fleeting thought in Daedalus' mind.

Edit: it just occured to me that suggesting to use herds of people as moving cover is not exactly the most humane thing to do... hrm : / gotta figure out what I think about that...

[Cedric Rolfsson]

Ronin, while all this discussion is going on OOC our characters are going to act only on the information they have IC.

I think the discussion is appropriate because our characters, I think all of them, have formal military training that would likely include emergency response scenarios. Erebus has small unit tactics which would help him know how to react in this situation and I have no knowledge that's comparable so I'm effectively trying to simulate that knowledge by picking the brains of all the other players. I figure between all of us we probably could come up with a Small Unit Tactics Knowledge skill of at least 3. :)

As to your suggested tactics I'm not sure. While Erebus as a character doesn't care about anyone not a member of his "gang" and would have no problem about ducking into a crowd of nuns to find cover, its unlikely that the bar is going to be with us long enough to provide much cover. Even a small missile is likely to make a mess of the place. Also, I doubt that any strike team that opens an ambush by firing a missile at a bar is going to give one nanosecond's hesitation about dropping another missile into a crowd of civilians. They'd just interfere in with our movements. Besides, it'll be almost impossible to get the civvies on their feet and heading out the back door in the kind of time we have before the missile hits.

As a rigger would Daedalus have an idea how much damage a missle like the one being shot at us could do to the bar? Is the bar's exterior wall going to hold up to the strike? I don't know nothing about no missiles.

[Tiredronin]

Daedalus has a pretty high small unit tactics and a good vantage point from the outside, maybe I can appeal to the powers that be for tactical insights :D

But yeah I wasn't planning on doing this before the missile strike. I was figuring after, so like.. it hits, we be like "ok everybody stay calm, lets move out the back, it must be a terrorist attack" or something like that. you know, to kinda appear like the good guys.

well tis just speculation anyway, and you do make a good point about the strike team that leads in with a missile strike.

As for the structural damage, my conservative estimate would be no, I woudn't expect the whole place to come crashing down from one missile, (esp if it is an AVM) but I could be wrong (ahm, once again appealing to the powers that be) cause.. Daedalus probably should know..

[bclements]

Ok, Questions in order of Appearance:

-WR: The corner of the yellow building next to the bar would put Dragon at 8 Meters from the blast. It would put you under partial cover from the goons across the street, and at roughly 20 meters away from them

-Cedric: Waiting on SR13 to roll initiative. I'm in no hurry, I'm enjoying watching y'all plan :rotate:

-Ronin: There are 6 total people in the bar. The waitress/barkeep, a cook, and 4 patrons. (Aside, SR4's Augmented Reality would really come in handy here with those drones). As of yet IC, all Daed knows it's a rocket, and its incoming. He's not jacked into the drone at the moment. Once you spend the action to jack in, Small Unit Tactic away :). If Sedna, WR1 or grendel want to chime in here, I'd be enlightened by their august presence :)

-All: Plan out as much as you want to OOC, it doesn't bother me. As Cedric pointed out, IC planned actions are going to require some sort of gesturing, hollering, or headware communications in order to communicate this plan to each other. These can be free actions: D&DV3 have worked together enough, Erebus and Temmou are ex-military (or close enough) to catch on almost instantly.

Missed anything? EDIT: Yes, yes I did.

[WinterRat1]

OK, given the uncertainty here, I'm going for the extra weapon. We shouldn't have a problem with the group, and Goon 3 is isolated, so hopefully he won't be much of an issue either. That being the case, I want to be loaded up for round 2, which I'd bet on at this point.

[Cedric Rolfsson]

I've actually figured out a reasonable way of communicating effectively in three words or less if I can get a ruling on whether this work's or not.

'contact'. . . to indicate the speaker has come into contact with hostile forces

'(1-12) o'clock'. . . . to give a relative direction of the threat

'low/high'. . . .to indicate a relative vertical threat axis(in an urban environment that would mean street level or roof top)

The question I have is the phrase "(1-12) o'clock" one word or two?

If the clock designation is two words or more then I'm open to ideas as a replacement. Any of you military types out there, this is your queue to chime in.

EDIT:: Uhhh, just had a terrifying thought, BC we're located within a few blocks of the Tacoma docks. Now, having driven past the docks on several occassions I know for a fact that there are a variety of very tall cranes etc. on the docks. Would any of those cranes have a good view down into the streets around the bar where we are at?

[Cedric desperately thinking of a way to deal with a missile bearing drone AND a pre-positioned sniper in overwatch from 900 meters away while carrying only a pistol. Frustrated, he shakes his fist at the sky and curses soundly paranoia enhancing, ulcer creating GMs. :D ]

[bclements]

Go for it, as a free action (the Speak a Word free action rules allow it). Oh yeah, forgot to tell you above regarding the Quickdraw: you'll fire in that action (that's what the test is for). If you don't want to do that, you can just spend a simple action to draw the weapon.

Re: the cranes. Yep, they're there, but they're a long way away. It's low light conditions. You'd need one hell of a scope...

[Cedric Rolfsson]

Oh, I can run fast and fire at the same time correct? that shouldn't be a problem.

Edit: BC you're an evil man. :)

Daedalus, can your drones look for snipers too as well as the missile bearing drone? Does anyone have any ideas for dealing with a sniper? I may be paranoid here but . . . . never mind, I remember all of the previous threats Dragon and Virgil have had to deal with, I'm not being paranoid, I'm just being realistic.

[bclements]

Yep, with modifiers (+4 to TN for running over smooth ground).

[Cedric Rolfsson]

Has anyone else noted a directly proportional relationship between the level of paranoia in a player and the number of missiles that have been launched in any given shadowrun game?

Maybe its just me.

After BC noted the cranes I thought,

Hmmm, if these guys were really nasty they would have placed a couple of claymore mines to cover the street in front of them in case someone is stupid enough to charge them. Or they could have placed demolition charges on the bottom side of any manhole covers just ready to detonate! ACK, there could be a panzer light tank around the corner!

BC, Sedna, I hope you guys are proud of yourself. If Erebus gets home he's going to be looking under his bunk for the Tir adept-assassin that is lurking there and will be too afraid of Troll cyberzombie hit squads to ever comfortably open his closet door again.
:notworthy: :notworthy:

[Sedna]

Hey! How'd I get pulled into this?

[bclements]

Hey, its Shadow's game. I'm just the fill in.

[WinterRat1]

[Cedric Rolfsson]

WinterRat1 is correct Sedna, you started lobbing missile around and now every GM wants to get in on the fun. :)

I have to say, Shadow's run is living up to his "John Woo-ish" style of game play. I'm going to see if I can get Erebus into a position where he can dive and slide across the hood of the car the goons are hiding behind while firing at least 30 rounds from his 12 shot clip, spin/roll/kip to his feet in time to twirl wildly around while firing his remaining 15 rounds. :D

[Cedric Rolfsson]

BC can we just proceed without SR13's initative for now? I know his initative isn't going to be as high as Dragon's or Erebus' and he's inside the bar still unaware of the incoming rocket.

Since he's the only one we're waiting for and he's still inside, unaware of what's happening I'd suggest we just get started with the combat round.

[Shadow]