Okay - good news, bad news, good news.

Good news is that I am now in a position to do three major IC posts, one for JD & Konsaki, one for BH and pragma, one for DR.

Bad news is that on top of all the wackiness that has me on semi-active status right now. a whole new and wholly unexpected pile of craziness hit my family today, so I won't put anything up tonight.

Good news - I expect to actually have all evening free tomorrow, so look for a major bump within 24.

pragma - talismonger shop post is up (great job on the set-up, by the way, BH).
Feel free to arrive whenever.

JDragon & Konsaki

I know your approved plan includes moving on back to reevaluate the two truck sites you already scouted in Auburn. I stopped where I did for three reasons:

1. Sort of going to try to not leave Sledge totally in the dust timeline-wise.
2. Wondering what you want to do about the cameras - Angel can get into them easily, but basically she can only cover two places at once - one sprite on remote location, and one place hacked personally. Now, I won't be surprised if you guys have a way around this - it's not my job to really think about it all that hard. You seemed interested in keeping eyes on everything, so wondering how you want to proceed.
3. You already have a pretty good write-up in a previous post on the truck sites, so rather than repeat all that again, I will leave it to you to IC your return to them. Your plan says you want to decide which is best - well, that's on you - let me know if you need anything clarified on any of the site descriptions.

Ok I'll think on it and pass some basic info on to the team tonight once I have a chance to review the details of the sites.

JD

Smith will be hoping to make a good impression - both because spring is a potential business contact, and because she's a friend of Deerwalkers, and so I'll let her formality or informality guide the tone of the meeting. I would like to gage her reactions, and get a general impression about her, and base my reactions and such appropriately.

Judge Intentions


Etiquette (to fit in, leave a good impression, be charming, likable, etc)


I'm hoping to basically get Fortunato invited, before he arrives (or find out if she's going to be overly paranoid and prefer he not show up) with enough time to send Fort the AR signal to come in or not... if it is a store, I'm hoping customers coming isn't out of hte ordinary, but its polite to ask.

Leadership (or negotiation, if either are necessary, to influence the situation to get Fortunato invited in, spring would otherwise be adverse to the idea)


And, FYI, the last bit was meant to leave the impression that if Fortunato were here, impulse-buys were an option, whereas if he is not, we'll be sticking to the list. From a business perspective, they have me at an advantage knowing that I don't know anything about what it is I am in the market for. I was hoping to help counteract that by offering spring incentive to even the playing field. Whether or not they bite... *shrugs* ...

I'm ok with a personal fast forward at some point to allow others to do their stuff.

ha, pretty much expected it to roll out like that.

Not expecting it, but keeping an eye open for any hint of annoyance in either of the girl's faces.
Deerwalker has never been shy, and I assume spring wouldn't own a shop if she didn't expect customers to show up - but since this is our first meeting with a new contact, I want to leave the best impression possible.

So, Smith is readying actions to smooth over the situation if it seems like its going south.

BlackHat - rolls are all fine - everything goes pretty much the way you want it to. Which makes for a pretty simple IC post - spring is fine with meeting Fort, everyone happy and apparently at ease.

Sounds good. Victory on my end! =D

Did you want us to abstract here and break down the OOC list of what Fort wants, and some negotiation rolls. Since both sides have two people, this might be a appropriate time to use teamwork.

I'm not sure if it is more appropriate for Smith, as the wallet, to handle the financials, with Fort assisting by providing magical commentary, or if Fort, as the end client, and the one who knows what he is talking about, should handle negotiations, with Smith backing him up with generic suggestions, and witty repartee.

I also don't think Fort ever told Smith what he expected this would cost, or how much he'd be willing to spend, or whatever. Willing to negotiate spending team-cash on stuff that is useful to everyone like the spells might be, but it sounds like they'd need to order it so we wouldn't have it in time for this mission anyway.

Translating the IC Post:

Fort wants to buy - formula for detect enemies. formula for enhance initiative (or whatever that health spell is called -- don't have books on hand), force 4 binding materials for a beast spirit.

He wouldn't mind buying binding materials for an air spirit, but he's going to hold off for today in the interest of buying a new fake SIN to slake his paranoia.

Moved our timestamp a little farther ahead, since there was conversation going on.

Smith still wants to remain sociable, and leave a good impression, and part of that is going to be letting Fortunato and spring do their thing, without butting in where he isn't wanted, or doesn't belong. He's no wallflower, though - so, he'll probably come up with something to add, and help make the meeting go smoothly, even if he doesn't know anything about magical crap. I assume Deerwalker participates, as well, but is, likewise, letting her friend Spring do her Shopkeeper thing - so Smith and Deerwalker and probably having some conversations of their own when Fort and spring are talking shop.

All those things are available here starting at base book price.

If you want to negotiate, it has to be done by Fort (based on the rules on language limitations on social skill tests - Johnson hasn't a clue what he'd be haggling for). But since Johnson provided the introduction and social lubricant, he can roll teamwork dice (negotiation successes add dice to Fort's test). No modifiers to the roll, now that sexual attraction is out!

You'll get a 5% discount per success, so feel free to go ahead with any rolls you want to make and work out how much money gets spent and by whom. Once that is done, someone please IC wrapping up the transaction.

Then, spring will have something to say to Fort before you guys leave.

An entirely reasonable ruling, given that we've established that Johnson's default to magical knowledge is unimpressive.
I'm slightly worried about the precedent, though.



Charisma (6) + Negotiation (5) = 11 dice
#D=11 : 61326526244 n1=1 n6=3 nHit=4

So, +4 dice to Fort's roll, unless Smith's dice pool is still capped (which would make sense, so I'll assume it does), in which case only the initial 6 dice count (which is still 3 of the 4 hits). I'd feel a little bad about you having to fend for yourself if Fortunato wasn't more charismatic than Smith! Probably less willing to spend edge, though.


Out for Fort, anyway - although I suppose since he's the one negotiating, that's where it matters.
Unless she's in the habit of giving away money to people with good-looking friends who also have average willpower.


Yeah, Johnson/Smith might have one last thing he wants to mention to spring too. Hoping to get some contact information, in case I get the opportunity to send more business her way, or if we want to make some special orders, and offer her mine, in case she's interested in doing the same. If she needs anything done, I don't want her to hesitate to call ("Anything, for a friend of Deerwalker's"). I also figure, she probably meets a lot of mages and shamans, and some of those might be looking for work - or looking for a way to get enough money to buy some particularly nice foci... and Smith is always looking for new talent. Some of them might even be looking for help with a problem.

Basically, like he has done with Nym, I am hoping to set the stage for the ability to meet new runners and possibly get new jobs through her (sort of get my name out there as a local Johnson, too).

It also gives me the opportunity to reiterate the idea in front of Deerwalker, since, if spring needs something done, that might be the sort of job Deerwalker would be interested in signing up for, which might be a good opportunity to get some combination of Cal, Deerwalker, and her Ecosquad interested in joining the reserves.

BlackHat - you make a reasonable point about the precedent being set.
Couple of things for you -
assume that in the future there may be NEGATIVE MODS to areas you are obviously totally ignorant in, but not a blanket exclusion like now - this case is based on your total lack of skill/knowledge as established and highlighted by role-playing and the earlier crappy die roll.
So not a full-on precedent.

Second, and if anyone is paying attention they can take this as a HOUSE RULE - in my game there will be no limitation on the number of specializations one can take in (1) Etiquette and (2) Lingos. It's a silly rule. If you want more than one spec in these areas, each successive one costs an extra karma point - 3 for the second spec, 4 for the third, and so on.

So that's a relatively cost-effective way to juice yourself up for dealing with different types of folks.

Go ahead and keep all four teamwork successes.

Any of that other stuff you want to bring up - great. Feel free to do so before or after my next IC for spring, which will come after the biz-wrap-up post one of you guys is doing.

@Dire



If that's fluff - cool. If it's not, need some dice.



That's a real trick in a place this raucous and crowded. But caution noted.

Fluff. If someone is here in place already, then it's all compromised beyond repair already.

Understood. Like I said, for this situation, I think it makes sense, and am more than happy to roll with it.

Negative modifiers sound reasonable, and I think it makes sense that rather than continuing to pump his social skills, Johnson might take some time to learn a little bit about being a "Johnson".

EDIT: I suppose that, in this case, its more of a 'face' job, than a 'Johnson' job - but whatever.

In the end, I shouldn't expect too much from a random college-student (despite being likable or lucky), who was only introduced to the Shadows a month or so ago. A few semesters of business management and finance negotiation classes will only get him so far.

Not interested in lodge materials anymore?
Looks like we're looking at 1K for the spells, and 2K (with errata) for the beast spirit.

Since Fort needs to roll, I'll let him handle the IC (unless he is busy, and would rather not) - and I'll add in afterwards. I'm not particularly worried about going before or after spring does.

If either the beast spirit is intended to be bound, and used, primarily for this mission, Johnson will gladly pay for those materials, since they are consumed. He's not opposed to covering the spells, either, but I'd appreciate it brought up in character, because it does raise the issue of how we, as a team, are going to reimburse people for tools used mid mission, that remain useful afterwards (Angel using drones, Smith needing a new bike, Cerb's ammo if he were around, Sledge's tools, etc).

In this case, maybe we could use party funds for the spells, let you learn them, but the formula remains team-gear, that others could learn (if we ever had another mage) or we coudl sell it back at some point. *shrugs* not sure. Seems fair to me, though. You're spending the karma, so you can keep the knowledge. It doesn't seem fair to have you spend Fort's own money for this stuff unless he intends to use them purely for his own agenda (sending the spirit off to do something not related to our mission).

At the same time, I don't want to volunteer to buy everyone guns, drones, and vehicles just because they'll probably be used for the good of the team at some point, while still splitting the profit on a given job. Maybe Smith is a little gun-shy after Cerb walked out with a 12K gun, that he had only half paid off. Either way, this mission is a special case because nobody is getting paid in nuyen - so I'd like to see that the 20K be used, by Johnson, to cover everything any of us end up needing for this mission.

If there is any cash left over at the end, we'll probably end up splitting it, and then people will be spending it on personal shit anyways.

Still interested in lodge materials -- just plumb forgot about them. Should add another 3k for a force 6 lodge.

Fort was planning to pay for the spells himself and for the lodge himself, but hoped to have the spirits purchased from team funds (it that's the case -- may well add the force 4 air spirit binding to the mix if we can afford it.) The reasoning was that he'd buy his own tools -- things that he could potentially use over and over -- but let the team buy mission-specific, expendable stuff.

This brings Fort's investment to 4k and the Johnson's to either 2k or 4k depending on whether or not he springs for a force 4 air spirit. I'll IC in a moment.

EDIT: by "in a moment" I mean tomorrow morning. Sleeping now.

This was what I was thinking, but I couldn't remember if the spells (especially detect enemies) played a role in this mission, or if they were something you wanted, anyway.

As far as the spirits, if Fort thinks he has a use for both spirits, they sound like decent investments. The modifications to the truck should run around $1,500. Even at double that, because they're forbidden, we're within budget, and AFAIK that is the last piece of equipment we're going to pick up before showing up for "work" tomorrow morning/evening.

Then again, I don't think we should throw two spirits at the problem just because we can. Having a spare 2K for any problems might not be a bad thing. Air spriits seemed pretty useful for fleeing before, though. Smith won't be hard to convince.

Also, before you IC, don't forget to roll negotiation.

Why am I doing the negotiating? Just because he knows the market?

Any rate, negotiation roll: negotiation # dice 9 :: 1 4 3 1 3 4 4 1 5 -- 1 hit
-- better hope that Fort doesn't have any negative modifiers.

Kept the IC short because I didn't want to suck the fun out of the back and forth banter. If you don't feel like posting a long conversation -- Fort's going to explain how bound spirits work in laymans terms and why Johnson should pay for those. (Do you want to introduce Adam as Smith to the team?)

Want the beast spirit as muscle and the air spirit for getaways. The team didn't see the beast spirits in use, but they were helpful.

Looks like I once again owe everyone some posts. Really eager to get them up, but won't be able to do them justice until I sleep. Look for them in about seven hours.

Take your time. It's a long weekend ahead for me anyway.

Johnson gave you 4 extra dice (I think 9 i your normal dice pool, so feel free to roll 4 more). Some banter (for the next 7 hours or so, before Adamu moves us on) sounds good.

4 extra dice: negotiation teamwork bonus # dice 4 :: 6 4 5 2 -- 2 hits

Which brings us to a grand total of 3 hits for the roll.

Also, did you intend to back the timestamp up (because this took place during the pervious 5 minutes of shopping) - otherwise, I had moved us forward five minutes to account for the conversations mentioned in our previous IC posts.

glad I helped.

So, it looks like both Fortunato and Smith need to fork over 4,000 * 85% = 3,400 nuyen.

Feel free to include it whenever we wrap up our IC chat

@Dire

No need for surprise tests - that already happened with the backstab. Now we'll continue with initiative for everyone.

Start with a melee damage soak.

Then initiative, actions, necessary rolls, and maybe a handful of melee reaction/soak combos.

Conditions under which you might use Edge.

To expedite in case adamu bumps while I'm away from the computer -- Fort's planning to auto-success a watcher for Johnson to talk to him. Then catch a cab home ( I paid 50 nuyen for the round trip, for reference ) and go on the astral scouting run.

Body 6 + Impact 6 6 hits

[5,1,5,2,5,5,6,1,6,3,3,3]

Init [6,4,5,5,1,5,5,6] = 14

Going to think on possible actions for a bit

Thanks for this, pragma.

I just tacked on what the NPC said. I'll leave the ICs of you guys' own actions to you as much as possible.

But these instructions do allow BlackHat to move forward with his own errands if he is ready to post before you are.

So basically everyone but Dire is pretty clear to IC

BUT

Although a series of weird misfortunes have resulted in my posting every day this week, my earlier announcement about a month of semi-activity was real. In fact, I very much doubt I'll be posting much, if at all, for at least the next week.

When I do get online, for this game I will be prioritizing Sledge's scene - she is way behind you guys in time, and yet I can see y'all wanting to call her about technical details, and she (if she survives) perhaps wanting to quickly communicate with the team.

As it is, we will have to contrive some excuse (if she survives) to be incommunicado for about half an hour to avoid a catastrophic time implosion. So I will be more into catching her up than pushing everyone else much further forward.

Take your time (see above!).

Your soak leaves you with 1P damage.

You will be going first in the upcoming combat turn.

Ummm - just cuz I am away from my computer for a bit doesn't mean you guys aren't allowed to post!

I am pretty sure I am caught up on everyone's needs and the ball is in y'all court for all groups.

And I really will try to respond to all posts in as timely a manner as possible.

Pragma: I'm assuming we're going to give some pleasant goodbyes and then part ways while you go home to astral-surf.

Whether or not Smith moves on to the meet with the mechanic will depend on Rocky's response regarding his comment about maybe needing more help stealing stuff - as it won't matter if I get a morphing plate and spoof chip if we don't get a truck to put them on.

I thought the plates and spoof chip were for the love machine.

Yeah, goodbyes and astral is in order.

I think we wanted to look into both, but if we're stealing a truck to drive into a heavily monitored part of town (carrying unconcealed stolen machinery) we're going to need some fake licenses and registrations to avoid detection.

Afterwards, we can take them and put them on the love machine, because otherwise that thing is a cop-beacon, too.

Ok, got another IC up, getting Rocky and Angel on the way to grab the truck.

Couple questions for you Adamu....
#1 - Are we still going on the give you a plan and go from there or will we be playing this out? (I think its the plan thing so I'll start working on that as soon as I can.)

#2 - Now that we have a better idea of the equipment we are picking up, and even seen some of it, do we know if it will all fit on the truck we have targeted? If not will the gear fit on any truck or is it just to big? - IF we need a bigger truck then we I'll want to look for one that will work as we get in to the area.

Thanks

JD

JD -

1. Still on the "outline plan" thing - you can refer back to the post where I explained that, but in brief, give me a plan in bullet points, along with any accompanying rolls you think you need. I give a green light to IC on all successful parts, and then if there is a snag or something, we go to playing things out until crisis is averted or whatever.

I think this will ultimately save us time without being too big a giveaway.

2. Both trucks you scouted are big enough to carry the cement cutter, and come equipped with ramps for that sort of thing.

The Plan - Getting the Truck

Based on the information available I think Rocky & Angel (and if anyone else shows up) will go for the 1st site they checked out that appeared to be laying pipe, with the Knights providing security.

On the way down Angel will try to get access to any security systems / cameras to get us an update on the status of the site as well as getting a site plan, security systems along with locations of possible targets (Acceptable trucks) and the security personal and their relation to each other and the trucks.

My hope is to find the truck that will meet our needs that is closest to the edge of the property as well as a main road for exit purposes. Once this is done we will plan our exit route as well as a meet up spot if we get separated. I will make sure I have a copy of the route and other info in my Comm. I would like the initial route to head us further in to / toward the barrens to provide more options if we are being chased.

Assuming that part goes well once we are with in a block I want to have Angel see if she can fake some kind of minor security issue on the other side of the site that will distract the Knights. While also looping or disabling the rest of the security sensors.

If she knows she can't do that I will see if we can in a reasonable amount of time; find a few guys/women that may be up for causing a little chaos and getting paid for it. I'm willing to pay up to 400Y to get the help. My first offer will be 150Y and go up from their. The plan here will be the same, have them cause some minor issues to distract the guards on the far side of the site from our target. I will not tell them what we are actually after.

One important thing is I want to make sure Angel or the hired help understand that it needs to be enough to get as many of the guards attention as possible with out them calling for back up, ect.

Once the distraction has been started we will drive the last block to the site and I will head inside. On my way in Angel will start working on the electronic security for the truck. I want to take a towel or shirt with me that I can use to muffle the noise of me breaking a window if its needed.

If their is a gate close by that we can use to exit the site with the truck, I will open that on the way in.

Once at the truck I will do one quick walk around looking for tire blocks and obvious RFID's, moving those as needed.

I will then break in to the truck and release the parking breaks and put it in Neutral and start pushing it toward the fence; once I get it moving I'll climb in and start it as it goes through the gate or gets with in 10m of the fence. ***This is assuming I think Rocky can push the truck him self. I'm still not 100% on the size of the truck and the limits of Rocky's strength

If getting it moving by pushing doesn't look possible or does not work than I will just start it like normal, using the hotwire instructions I looked up in route if needed.

Once the truck is running I will exit the area post haste, giving the team a call to find out where we need to take it to get the plates and chip for it. If we are going to have to wait for the team I will look into finding somewhere out of the way we can park the truck till we are ready to go. IF possible Angel or I will get the needed information from the truck and forward it on to Smith.


/Plan

Well I think that covers it, if any one has any suggestions please speak up otherwise I'm going with this as written.

JD

JD- thanks for the detailed plan.

There are some things I want to check out, and it will be a couple of days before I have access to my BBB.

But that'll give others a chance to make the comments you invited anyway!

Provided you give the final green light on your plan by Monday night my time, I will have a resolution for you then.

If I have not posted otherwise, please feel free to move forward on Monday night when you get to it.

The couple of days will be plenty for any feedback on the plan and I don't want to slow things down.

JD

Seems reasonable to me. I feel bad for the poor gangers you're considering paying $150 to be shot to death by bored trigger happy guards.

Well such is the life of gangers.

Also, I'm not telling them to go get shot, just provide enough commotion that will get the guards headed and looking away from the real target. Now if that means them getting shot and me not, so be it. Survival of the fittest my man.


JD

It's cool. That's pretty much how Smith feels about you guys.

Gee thanks.

Jd

I'm just sayin'.... I appreciate you guys stealing the truck while Smith bangs chicks, and hangs out with his friends.

Well somebody's gotta do it. Might as well be the trog.

Not like Rocky would have been much help on the stuff Smith has been doing.

I just hope I covered everything in my plan and it goes well, I'm really not looking to play with the Knights tonight. On the other hand it would be kinda cool to get to test out the new adept powers I got with all that karma. And at least I should see the hit coming unlike the wrench to the back Sledge got.

JD

Sorry folks, I'm struggling a bit, finally going to visit the dentist for some long overdue torture, I'll try and get things moving along as soon as possible from my part. I can tell you're chomping at the bit to keep it going.

Knife to the back. Wrench is coming from the front.

Details, people!!!