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RedKnightSpecial
I just wanted to tell the story of my group's first run. Feel free to critique my plotmaking skills or point out anything hinky we may have done ruleswise. We are all new to 4th ed.

The group consists of a Jack of all trades (joat) fellow who digs pistols, a lightly cybered samurai, and a melee weapon toting ex-Urban Brawler physad.

The group's collective Johnson (man that sounds weird) informed them that their job would be to kidnap a local rockstar during her show. It had to be during her set. There would be weapons hidden under their seats in the VIP section. Pay would only be 2K each, but also they would each earn 2 months High Lifestyle in a condo run by Johnson.

He told them the star's name, but they never bothered to find anything out about her (??). What they did begin immediately asking for was better stuff to be stowed under their seats. He ended up agreeing on pepper grenades, flashpacks, and carbon fiber knives along with the orgional pistols.

At this point, out of the blue, the teenager in the party (our physad) has his character run to a pawnshop and buy an electric guitar. So he will fit in at a rock show. He is a funny kid. The Joat character runs to buy some radio controlled car's to throw on the roof to set off motion detectors. I couldn't make this stuff up. The samurai does a decently smart thing and hires some local gangster teens through his gang leader contact. He gives them 300 nuyen each and tells them to make a distraction on his signal.

OK, concert time. Samurai enters the venure with a gasmask and a tanktop on. It's technically legal, so they let him in. The other two party members camp out behind the venue. The Physad has no stealth, so he begins to wail on his guitar, pretending to be a panhandler. He has no guitar skill at all. the back alley Securty guard shakes his head and tells the physad to keep his distance.

Samurai hands out flashbangs to the drunken ganger kids. they accidently set one off before he gives them the signal and run around in circles holding their eyes. Distraction successful. The samurai guns down a sec guard and then eats a full auto pistol blast from the singer's bodyguard, taking 9p. Ouch.

Outside, physad rushes the backdoor sec guard with his guitar and beats the hell out of him with it. Phys ad owns a 3 force katana weapon focus, but he likes his guitar, I guess. He then rushes into the venue to meet the body guard and singer rushing out. They put a bullet in him and run towards the stairs to the roof.

Shortening the story a bit here, I decide I better tone things down a bit because my runners are getting really hurt. Samurai is 2 physical boxes from death, and physad ia hurt as well. The bad guys start doing dumb things like taking single shots with auto weapons and dropping flashpacks.

Outside the Joat starts his car and then throws some remote control cars onto the roof of the venue to "set off motion detectors". The guard up on the roof answers this by putting a long burst from his AK97 into Joat's car. Car totaled.

The other runners manage to take out the bodyguard (with a pepper grenade, it was kinda cool) and get on the roof, where the singer is attepmting to take off in a wasp. Joat attempts to toss a frag grenade into the melee on the roof from his car in the alley, but misses (No successes on 10 dice). The phys ad decapitates the sec guard on the roof and severely injures the singer. She quits.

They steal a Stuffer Shack truck and get her to the meeting point. MR. Johnson is delighted at the job they have done. He congratulates them, pulls out a pistol, and murders the singer. He instructs them to leave he body in the street. They go home to their new digs, perplexed.

Tommorow they will see the headlines in the newspaper about how local hoodlums used new cheap plastic guns to sneak by security at a local concert and kidnap/murder a rich corper's daughter. The Johnson just wanted bad publicity for a competitor's new all composite pistol that was just hitting the street. Not sure if they will figure that out.

The runners did some dumb stuff, but we all had a good time, and a LOT of laughs.
Edward
There are 2 issues I see.

First I never came up with a reliable way to hit somebody with a full auto pistol or SMG (to much recoil). It can be done with more modest bursts and heavily customised weapons but those weapons are usually only held buy runners, special forces units and rich corporates (for themselves not those around them).

Also most guards at a concert would not have a good fir arms skill, they don’t get much practise.

That’s not much of an issue however.

The problem with the plot is that the motivation is counter productive. While the general public will be unhappy with the gun those that have a use of such a weapon will become more aware of this brand and know that it has worked in the past, in short I would expert sales to increase, although the producer will have to deal with a larger than normal mount of hate mail.

Edward
Ed_209a
The first thing that came to my mind is...

Your players think it's ok to _live_ in a place your _johnson_ gives you?

Actually, new players may think this ok. After all, ignorance (simply not knowing) is curable, stupidity is terminal.

Your players will want as little contact with the Johnson as possible, particularly after the deed is done.

The perfect payment IMO is certified credsticks, (which themselves might be laundered if above a certain amount) and 3rd party goods in trade.

Barter is alive and well in the shadows.

Oh, the reason the players shouldn't want to live in the Johnson's condo is that, well _accidents happen_... No runners, no trail to Mr Johnson.

dog_xinu
QUOTE (Ed_209a)
The first thing that came to my mind is...

Your players think it's ok to _live_ in a place your _johnson_ gives you?

Actually, new players may think this ok. After all, ignorance (simply not knowing) is curable, stupidity is terminal.

Your players will want as little contact with the Johnson as possible, particularly after the deed is done.

The perfect payment IMO is certified credsticks, (which themselves might be laundered if above a certain amount) and 3rd party goods in trade.

Barter is alive and well in the shadows.

Oh, the reason the players shouldn't want to live in the Johnson's condo is that, well _accidents happen_... No runners, no trail to Mr Johnson.


Ok.. I am one of the players. You have been WARNED!

I tooks the nuyen.gif offered but I was not planning on living where the johnson/fixer or whatever he may be decides he wants me. I have 2 low lifestyles on purpose. Live in one and if it gets trashed I move on to the next.

the money was low but not extremely low. the other players wanted the deal and I figured 2k nuyen.gif is better than no nuyen.gif so I agreed.

As for the little crawlers that I threw on the roof. I scoped the venue out the night before and noticed there were motion detectors on the roof (or what looked to be motion detectors and I was conviced it was...). I figured if I threw thow some 5 nuyen.gif crawlers up there on the roof it would set off the motion sensors and it would help force the woman out the back door.

As for only one runner in the place? well it doesnt take 3 gangers and multiple runners to start a riot and get the starlet running towards the back door. The one runner can help force the issue with the gangers start the mess err I mean distraction/chaos. The plan was for the PhysAd and me to stop the personal bodyguard (red samuri!!!!) and grab the girl. The guard on the roof was unexpected and I did some damage to hit before he destoyed the stolen van. Yes it was stolen about 30 minutes before the heisst so we could ditch it and it would not be reported as of yet.

And for the damage the Sammie took. Well the DM/GM rolled reeeallllyyy well and the player just sucked at rolling (that time). It was like kismet or karma or something going on. the SMG was staged up to something like a billizion P DV (ok maybe not that high but it was up there). So that is what almost killed him.

As for not checking into her. The Johnson was very clear that he did not want us checking into the details of the run or him or his money or who his clients are. And since I was nearly broke (starting character) and this is the single run the GM had I was not going to say "F* Y*" to the guy. Or violate his rules. Now that I have some cred, I can be a little more picky about my runs and about what rules/instructions to follow.

All and All it was a fun game
Dog
And that's the important part. If all of you guys enjoyed it, then rock on!

You'll find that as time goes on you'll get tired of some tactics, gear and character types, and start to expand your thinking as runners. Enjoy the experience. Probably one of the first things that'll come up is that your team is generally combat oriented. Eventually, you'll want to play technogeeks, mage/nerds and so on. But you guys are off to an excellent start.
You'll be missing out on some of the best stuff about SR if you don't look into some of the associated metaplot and sourcebook stuff. Don't skip the older stuff, either.

Is this your first RPG experience, too? (Doesn't sound like it to me.)
dog_xinu
QUOTE (Dog)
And that's the important part. If all of you guys enjoyed it, then rock on!

You'll find that as time goes on you'll get tired of some tactics, gear and character types, and start to expand your thinking as runners. Enjoy the experience. Probably one of the first things that'll come up is that your team is generally combat oriented. Eventually, you'll want to play technogeeks, mage/nerds and so on. But you guys are off to an excellent start.
You'll be missing out on some of the best stuff about SR if you don't look into some of the associated metaplot and sourcebook stuff. Don't skip the older stuff, either.

Is this your first RPG experience, too? (Doesn't sound like it to me.)

I have been playing RPGs for almost 25 years now (which is longer than our PhysAd has been alive in RL). I have played every version of SR. Granted I only played SR1 for about a month before we moved to SR2. I have played every basic archtype in the book. I was tired of the PhysAds or Riggers or what not and decided to play a Sammie (was called a Joat early). That was before I realized that we have no magic support. So I will probably play mage/shaman next after this guy gets killed. Not looking to do so but we all die eventually.

dx
ShadowDragon8685
Generally, you don't want to do stuff like this.

Not only did you get an innocent girl killed; for an apparently fucked-up reason, at that, you didn't do your homework.

When Johnson tells you DO NOT look into something, that's your warning bell to start walkin'.

"Don't look into this box I want you to deliver to a Mafia don, or I'll have you whacked. What? Heavy? Don't worry about it. I said, don't worry about it..."

That box probably is full of C12. Same with this. What possible reason could J have wanted with the girl? The only reason was murder.

Good job. Wetwork-by-proxy, a nice reputation to have. Not. Now when the next sicko J comes along wanting people who'll grab at the nuyen.gif and do despicable deeds for it, your name is the first that comes to his mind.

I'd retire the character in shame. And by "retire", I mean "go down trying to kill the Mr. J who set me up to kill an innocent girl."
caramel frappuccino
3...2...1...
RedKnightSpecial
Actully I have to apologize. I either mispoke or didn't get the message through clearly. the Johnson didn't care about you looking into the run, he just doesn't want you researching him. I feel bad, I guess I should have made that more clear! About them accepting the Corp husing, I probobly won't be too mean about it for awhile, the other two fellows are pretty new. I will be getting steadily dirtier, though.

About the rep...these guys are pretty dang cold blooded! One of the parts I skipped over (among too many, I now realize, apologies to you, Xinu) was when Samurai went back into the mostly deserted concert hall and emptied a clip into one of the gangers that he had hired because he was injured an thus a liability. The other players didn't bat an eye. Not that I mind. DMing for cold motherfuckers is just as fun a GMing for do-gooders, IMO

Also, in the interest of brevity, I left some stuff out. Joat did hotwire a car. Actually 2, after the first got shot up. He did do a lil legwork as well. The idea of the remote control vehicles just tickled me. Still does! That's the kind of stuff that make SR a great game to me.

About the sec guards not having the kind of skill to handle a full auto pistol...you are right. They didn't even have guns. The girl's bodyguard was very skilled, however, and rolled reeeeaaaallllyyy well. They were warned about that fellow. the two back up bodyguards (on the roof and out back) weren't nearly as skilled.

Wait till the next adventure, Scott, I have a pretty dang good idea. I am tempted to tell Dom to hold off another week, but I don't wanna be greedy.

***Edit** And don't mind Shadow Dragon's post, he is still mad about everyone calling him on his hentai-run. Sicko.
pragma
extinguish.gif. Things are heating up awfully quickly.

That said, I do think that opinions about runner morality are massively different from person to person. Every group I've played with has viewed Shadowrunners as desperate killers, thieves and thugs clinging to the bottom rung of a society which doesn't want them. As a result I tend to have been in rather cold blooded games and I've seen that experience echoed around the board.

There's room for morality in Shadowrun, but in my mind being used to get a woman killed isn't material to retire a character over. in fact, its all in a days work for most runners.

The run itself sounded pretty good. A reasonable smear campaign and an excellent firefight.
tisoz
QUOTE (dog_xinu)
I was tired of the PhysAds or Riggers or what not and decided to play a Sammie (was called a Joat early).

Ah, I was going to ask if you designed a JoAT or just ended up looking like one with the 4th edition restrictions and caps.

QUOTE (ShadowDragon8685)
What possible reason could J have wanted with the girl? The only reason was murder.

The usual reason for kidnapping is ransom, sometimes as leverage or coercion. Many times it ends in murder, anyway. Obviously someone has some money or pull to have several bodyguards.

Now if he had said, "Kidnap the waitress," you may have had a better point.
Drac
This Run seems like a big mess to me...and if I was a bouncer and saw some street scum walk in to the club wearing a gas mask I think I'd suspect something bad was about to happen.
Valentinew
Depends on the club....
Glyph
If it was a rave, he'd fit right in.
Gerald Fitzgerald
That'd be a good trick to play on runners.

On whatever mission they're sent on (let's say they have to break up a suit and tie meeting of some corporate muckity mucks) and they head off to the high rent district of Seattle.

On the way there, they see two men in jackets hanging out on the street corner. They're wearing gas masks. Odd, but as long as you throw in a few other shadorrun "details" they'll make little note of it.

Until a few miles up the road, someone is carjacked. A woman is pulled from her Americar by a troll wearing a gas mask. The car drives off, the woman is unharmed.

By now they'll be looking for people with gas masks and will probably question one if they get the chance. Make it impossible. Trideo in the window of a store nearby shows the news... on the news is two people wearing gas masks. Any attempt to watch this news will show they have moved on to a different story.

Will they put on gas masks now? Maybe they don't have them.

They call their contact. "I need a few gas masks."

"What the fuck is the deal?" the contact asks. "Why is everyone after gas masks tonight? I'm sold out; maybe you can tell me why everyone wants them all of a sudden?"

No help there. Now it's a more pressing issue.

This might be enough to send them off on a "let's find some gas masks" tangent. If not, they'll make it to the mission. Slip one of the runners a note.

"You see two men on the fortieth floor of the skyscraper looking out the window. They both have gas masks. When they notice you, they slink back into the shadows."

Why does Seattle have gas masks on!? What is the big deal!? Is something going to happen and your shadowrunners are out of the loop!?

Let them see two men fighting over a gas mask in the alley. One man pulls out a gun and kills the other man. He takes the gas mask and runs. People are killing eachother for them? What's going on?

What's going on would ultimately be up to you. Here's a possibility:

1. Some other shadowrun team elsewhere in the city is attempting to stop a psychopath from releasing a deadly nerve gas into the city. Before they entered combat, they called their families/contacts and told them to get gas masks ASAFP in case they failed. Word spread, but it's only been an hour. Not a lot of people know WHY they're donning these respirators.

CATCH: Let them trace these rumors backwards through friends-of-a-friend. Ultimately, they will find the source: a contact of the other shadowrun group. It's been an hour and a half and they haven't heard from the ShadowRunners. For the sake of the city, they need to go find these poor runners and help them. The other Shadowrun team won't know how you found them, but they will be glad you did.

In the end, they cut your team in on some of the nuyen, which was just a little bit more than the other mission would have paid. Plus, you made a few friends in the Shadows.
Critias
QUOTE (ShadowDragon8685)
Generally, you don't want to do stuff like this.

Not only did you get an innocent girl killed; for an apparently fucked-up reason, at that, you didn't do your homework....blah blah blah...Good job. Wetwork-by-proxy, a nice reputation to have. Not. Now when the next sicko J comes along wanting people who'll grab at the nuyen.gif and do despicable deeds for it, your name is the first that comes to his mind.

I'd retire the character in shame. And by "retire", I mean "go down trying to kill the Mr. J who set me up to kill an innocent girl."

Oh noes!

Shadowrunners did something morally wrong?! What's the world coming to?

Get over yourself. Not everyone plays such morally upstanding citizens as your nymphomaniacal lesbian store-clerk molester (hey, wait...).

Sometimes Shadowrunners do wetwork by proxy, just like sometimes they do wetwork. Sometimes, those targets are even female. You know what? Whoopty shit. A job's a job -- if you walk away, and take a credstick with you, call it a win.
Gerald Fitzgerald
QUOTE
Oh noes!

Shadowrunners did something morally wrong?! What's the world coming to?

Get over yourself. Not everyone plays such morally upstanding citizens as your nymphomaniacal lesbian store-clerk molester (hey, wait...).

Sometimes Shadowrunners do wetwork by proxy, just like sometimes they do wetwork. Sometimes, those targets are even female. You know what? Whoopty shit. A job's a job -- if you walk away, and take a credstick with you, call it a win.


I'm going to agree here too. Only ONE innocent person died during a ShadowRun? If we could all only maintain such a nice average.

Should mention, however, I wouldn't live in a lifestyle my johnson paid for. I'd take the nuyen for it and buy it myself.
Critias
And, edging away from The Shadowrunner Morality Police, a comment on the job itself -- glad everyone seemed to have fun, GM included. That said, I would rethink the basic premise of the job (IE, Johnson's involvement). Getting a pop starlet killed in the middle of a show by some super-cool plastic guns? Fine. Doing it so that the sale of those plastic guns goes down? Doubtfull.

Remember how Berettas spiked in sales after Lethal Weapon? Remember how Glock sales went up after the ridiculous ideas they could be walked through metal detectors? Die Hard, wasn't it? "This is my Glock 7. It's invisible to metal detectors, and costs more than you make in a month." (which is funny because all three statements are grossly incorrect)

I'd have had Johnson do this because he was directly profiting from those guns, himself. Secret a few polymer pistols where the 'runners can get them, have the 'runners kill a hottie on national tridvision, and then make sure the media blows the whole thing up and demonizes that gun... and guess what? Sales are gonna go up, up, up. Every Shadowrunner, wannabe, assassin, tough guy, and previously-undecided-as-to-what-handgun-to-buy-next guy in the world is gonna go snatch one up.

That's not a smear campaign. It's free advertising.
SL James
Die Hard 2: Die Harder, actually.

And I agree. A smear campaign isn't succeeding. A smear campaign would be one wherein the gun explodes in the assassin's hand on international trid, becoming a viral meme across the Matrix.

Now then, I'm going to go play with my Glock fohty and Oh, shit! My leg!
RedKnightSpecial
I actually hadn't considered that angle. Perhaps I can have the smear campaig backfire and bring some heat on the Johnson from his superiors, thus causing reason for more runs. thanks guys.
Critias
No problem. Being cynical is what they keep me around for.
DocMortand
To be completely honest, I just pulled that on my runners a couple of weeks ago - extract a scientist, only to have the scientist offed right in front of them, and then the J sicced some gangers on the runners.

THis will probably turn into a big "hunt down the J" party soon enough because two of the three runners that were there are either vindictive or paranoid AND vindictive. smile.gif

So you can use this experience of wetwork by proxy to define what your team will and will not do in later adventures - and quickly wipes the innocence out of newbies.

Sounds good to me!
SL James
One runner team hunting down a Johnson?

How adorable.
RedKnightSpecial
Might be interesting with my team. their Johnson is..I believe it's called a Prime Runner?
Critias
I had a team try that once.

Teehee.
dog_xinu
QUOTE
Generally, you don't want to do stuff like this.

Not only did you get an innocent girl killed; for an apparently fucked-up reason, at that, you didn't do your homework.


maybe my character doesnt care about killing someone? You have no idea my character's background nor his ideaology/philiopshy/outlook on life. And actually he has not any issues killing someone that he is contracted to do so. No wetwork is not his first choice but we all have to make decisons.

QUOTE
When Johnson tells you DO NOT look into something, that's your warning bell to start walkin'. 


or it is a sign that the adventure is going to be an adventure.

QUOTE
I'd retire the character in shame. And by "retire", I mean "go down trying to kill the Mr. J who set me up to kill an innocent girl."


We all have different opinions on what I should or should not do. I dont know if I trust this guy so I dont what I will do (Sorry RedKightSpecial if this is giving you insight on what I might do). Personally I think you need to get off you high horse. If the "runner" jobs were 100% up and up then they would not need runners would they? Runners do jobs that corps do not want to do directly or have the jobs tied back to them. Ok replace corps with gangs/mafia/triads/government/what not in some cases.

QUOTE
About the rep...these guys are pretty dang cold blooded! One of the parts I skipped over (among too many, I now realize, apologies to you, Xinu) was when Samurai went back into the mostly deserted concert hall and emptied a clip into one of the gangers that he had hired because he was injured an thus a liability. The other players didn't bat an eye. Not that I mind. DMing for cold motherfuckers is just as fun a GMing  for do-gooders, IMO


Well my character was outside and did not see this. This is not cool in his eyes. These guys were a (sub-)part of the team and should be treated with respect and not cold blooded murder. Now I personally as a player saw what happened and was not too keen on it but I could not say anything since I was noyt there. Now when my character finds out, then we will see what happens.

QUOTE
Also, in the interest of brevity, I left some stuff out. Joat did hotwire a car. Actually 2, after the first got shot up. He did do a lil legwork as well. The idea of the remote control vehicles just tickled me. Still does! That's the kind of stuff that make SR a great game to me.


runners are hired to think out of the box. And you dropped a few hints about the helopad and I missed it (I heard you but it went in one ear and out the other). If I had realized that, I would have had other plans for the roof. my bad.

QUOTE
The girl's bodyguard was very skilled, however, and rolled reeeeaaaallllyyy well. They were warned about that fellow


we were warned and I was surprised on how well this guy rolled. it was very different than the rest of the evening for the DM. The DM was getting about 25-33% of his dice were successes for most of the evening which is low-average percentage wise. This one roll he was well over 60%. That is why they call it random.

QUOTE
Wait till the next adventure, Scott, I have a pretty dang good idea. I am tempted to tell Dom to hold off another week, but I don't wanna be greedy.


that is cool. I could always run an adventure. My adventure would not be one night only. It would be a few weeks in a row. we can always talk later.

dx

edited to fix the quotes... bad type-o on my part.
warrior_allanon
just spent out last weekend playing SR4, Whats up with the SR4 johnson double crosses, seems like every GM is doing it. we were sent in to snag some drone prototypes from shiawase 5K each total, we were given the codes to get in, i mean easy cheasy milk run right, believe it or not getting the drones was that easy. Well we show up to deliver the "drones" half an hour early and find another team ready to ambush us and they fail miserably, i mean we cut through them like it was nothing. Later we try and fence the "drones" so we can get at least some cash from this little mission and find out its nothing but large metal marbles.... this is definately turning not so much a hunt the johnson, we know where he is, and are keeping track of him quite easily, but frag him over so badly that he gets fired and put on a level where we can kill him
blakkie
QUOTE
Whats up with the SR4 johnson double crosses, seems like every GM is doing it.


Such troubling times when you cannot fully trust your Johnson. Surely this is not SR? rotfl.gif

QUOTE
Later we try and fence the "drones" so we can get at least some cash from this little mission


What, the organlegger's cheque for the ambush team's corpses bounced? cool.gif
warrior_allanon
you know what blackie, we didnt even think of that.....will have to remember that one...
blakkie
If you cleared them out that handily you would hopefully have enough time to grap a few corpses, gear and all, and hightail. This wireless stuff in SR4 does make things a bit trickier, so you need a tag eraser or something like a head jammer but body bag sized. Even better if it also has refridgerator coils built in for chilling the body to try keep the bioware salvagable.
Feshy
QUOTE (blakkie @ Nov 24 2005, 04:47 PM)
If you cleared them out that handily you would hopefully have enough time to grap a few corpses, gear and all, and hightail.  This wireless stuff in SR4 does make things a bit trickier, so you need a tag eraser or something like a head jammer but body bag sized.  Even better if it also has refridgerator coils built in for chilling the body to try keep the bioware salvagable.

LOL!

I vote we call such a device a Blakkie Body Bag. Now with polymer weave, to prevent nasty tears from your "willing donor's" still extended spurs...

Edit:

"You're playing a character with street doc skills? You wanna help people or something? You sure you're going to fit in with the rest of this group of cold blooded killers?"

*30 minutes later, the "cold blooded killers" are vomiting from the smell of the autopsy / monetary reimbursement proceedure performed by the "nice guy" street doc*
Dog
QUOTE (dog_xinu @ Nov 23 2005, 02:12 AM)
I have been playing RPGs for almost 25 years now (which is longer than our PhysAd has been alive in RL).  I have played every version of SR.  Granted I only played SR1 for about a month before we moved to SR2.  I have played every basic archtype in the book.  I was tired of the PhysAds or Riggers or what not and decided to play a Sammie (was called a Joat early).


Well, then it hardly qualifies as your first run, does it? In that case, I'd say I'm surprised that the "we just did what we were told to get the reward" approach still gets you excited. Waste of a good plot hook, you ask me. But... (shrugs) to each his own. Enjoy your game.
RedKnightSpecial
I half expected them to talk to the Ork girl or something, but it never came up. I had contingencies planned for if they decided to rescue her instead of doing as they were told. But they wanted to do it by the book, which is fine by me. This was our first time really Roleplaying together and I was glad there were so few spanners in the works.
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