Does anyone else's GM let them do this? During downtime when I decide I need some new software, I hire my own team to watch my ass in case I get beaten in the Matrix and Lone Star comes for me. I paid them 500 to 1000 nuyen each, depending on how rough it might get.

So far I've only Hacked into a minor but high-end corp in Seattle to steal some rating 6 agents, which went very smoothly. Next I'm going for GM-Nissan to get some rating 6 Pilots for my Patrol Car and Doberman. It's fun and the GM doesn't have to plan as much. Oh, and I save a little cash.

Players as Mr J. works with a good gaming group, and assuming that you get downtime and your GM doesn't glaze over it for interest of story. I play in an online game so there's always 'downtime' where a player can run a run to get something they want and pay the other PCs for it and such, but the game there has its own rules about payment and things like that.

My last group did this occasionally. As GM, I think it's great. It's also, IMO, completely realistic.

Jobs can come from anywhere.

Neat-o. I figured everyone tried to pull stuff like this.
I'm trying to hatch a scheme to get some bioware or cyberware stolen and implanted. I figure it's a bad idea to kidnap a surgeon and force him to do it, who knows what strange "mistakes" he might make. So now I'm thinking I should find someone that is going to get the surgery I want, then insert myself in their place after it's been paid for.

Maybe find a clinic with an automated scheduling system, hack it so somebody is told the wrong time, preferably after the actual procedure, then come in in his place.

or, you can get yourself a remote surgery unit, an agent with an appropriate autosoft or, better yet, a machine sprite with an appropriate autosoft (you definitely want glitches negated on this test, so having a sprite there is good. the extra dice that come from having a sprite are just gravy).

once you've got that set up, it's a simple matter of stealing the parts... which presumably should be available in the place you're getting the surgery at =)

My first character (decker) would do some hacking into lower level corps and steal cash in between runs (in our groups downtime). Since the team would allow me to "crash" in their driveways (I lived in a back of a GMC Bulldog), I would pay the team their "share" of the cash. Which was 10% compared to my 90%. The GM liked what I was doing, I enjoyed it. The team liked the extra cash. And they got to keep an eye on me. I did like to "venture" into bad terrority.

Now I had a PC wanted to play a Johnson fulltime not hire the other players to just to be a Johnson. I wouldnt let him do it. But I did allow him to work on his contacts to "retire" into that position.

When my players had to take out a Toxic Shaman who had just melted the party mage, they hired three newbie mages to provide cheap counterspelling and to asist in the capture of the Toxy. They weren't excatly up to snuff, but they did salvage one good NPC mage out of it. It was also a bad way to break into the "Mr. Johnson" scene; hiring poor kids to get melted by a horrible monster.

One time my group hired a team of newbie runners to create a ruckus about the same distance away from the Star HQ, but on the other side from the facility that we were to create a ruckus at.

The result was, of course, the the Star High Threat Response team was about twice as far from where they should be when the call came in that there were several large explosions and the sounds of heavy machine gun fire coming from the R&D building that our team was 'infiltrating.' (It's amazing what the order to 'disrupt research' can allow for)

The newbie team wasn't told that they were a distraction, of course, and we did sell a tip to their target that a team was going to hit them. The newbies were happy to be paid at all considering they didn't even accomplish the objective they were hired for... Of course, we ended up paying less than was initially bargained for because two of their team members didn't make it back.

Slump,

Your team had better hope that the fact that you tipped off the target of a run against them doesn't get out, or it could hurt your rep. Fragging over runners is what low-life Johnsons do. There was no need to do it, as your objective was to get Lone Star HTR team tied up with them.

As a GM, I have no problem letting player characters do so - they need enough street repution to do so, though, and if they screw their subcontractors, it's even worse for that reputation than if a corp suit would do so.

As a player, I find it a bit problematic if a GM uses his PCs as NPCs, though the Johnson scheme might work out...
On the other hand, the worst kind of suicide missions I witnessed were issued by fellow players, while the GM did not really care about the consequences.

I had a face type character who sunk about 150 BP into contacts. He would call his many friends and ask for a favor or offer them a mission whenever something popped up that he was not sure he could handle. It was fun, but eventually the DM decided that crimelord was not a valid character choice for a new runner.

i dunno. i think that could be kinda cool in it's own way.

of course, that may be because i have about as much fun building characters as i do playing them, and it certainly makes it possible to have a continuously changing cast of characters for the rest of the team if they so desire =P

it would certainly make things almost weird though...