Thanks for the clarification about Dean. I either missed that or saw it but didn't retain it.

As for the Aurora Warrens, I'm trying to have a bit of OOC/IC separation between what I know and Mato knows. In my head Mato is not very knowledgeable about Denver, but maybe I'm just unsure what is common knowledge among the inhabitants of the Sixth World.

Yeah, I get that. Of course, I cannot really tell you what would be fine, since I do not know what you know.

But the general idea of what to expect there should be pretty clear, I think.

Bye
Thanee

I didn't give Tamarind any knowledge or contacts reflecting her time in the FRFZ -- I've basically just say she was stuck in camps in the hills and running vehicles and drones on grid guide for deliveries, more or less too depressed and alienated to have made the effort to learn the place much.

But I couldn't resist sliding a little player knowledge of Paradise Lane in, anyway

Hmm... I really don't think horses are a common sight in the middle of the city.

That is more for the outskirts.

Bye
Thanee

Also... why do you even need to split up? Unless you want to get to the physical cameras, hacking works from pretty much anywhere, right?

Bye
Thanee

Good point, though I assumed direct connections to the cameras, it's likely easier to enter the host and check all camera data there directly.

I vividly recall a combination of levitation and invisibility to hack traffic cameras directly.

Do we have any accommodations for the evening? Did Razak arrange for anything, or is there something available at the Ranch?

If we're going to the Warrens, Mato would like to change out of his suit. He also thinks it would be wise to drop off some of our equipment so it isn't unnecessarily exposed to sticky-fingered locals.

I am not sure, if it was mentioned or not, but there should be no problem to get accomodations at the ranch. They got plenty room there.

Bye
Thanee

Thanee, can you push things forward, assuming we arrived at the escape route one way or the other? E.g., do we even find cameras and such that we can milk information from? If so, what do I need to roll?

I feel like you are still talking about what you could do, instead of actually doing something.

If we move forward, you need to give the direction.


You already found cameras earlier, when you were there. As implied above, you could just hack them remotely.

Driving back there would cost you quite a bit of time, if you want to do that. You are much closer to the talismongers right now.


If you want to hack remotely, you need a Mark on the camera, right? Do you use Hack on the Fly?

I do not know the SR5 Matrix rules very well. So, being a little more concrete would help a lot.

Bye
Thanee

Hack on the fly: she has 6 logic and 8 hacking, +2 for hot sim, +3 for improved logic, totaling 19 dice.

hack on the fly: 3#19d6t5 9 4 6
limit is 8.
Improve logic drain: 11d6t5 2
Improve logic: 12d6t5 3

What's next? Edit file? (also, I rolled 3 times because I did not know how many cameras we need to hack).

Edit File would be used to copy the video logs, if that is what you want to do.

Bye
Thanee

Sure lets do it, less time in the scene of the crime is best.

@Jack - I planned for AM to stick to the car for VR hacking rather than stay at the restaurant or something. So she can also go to the talismonger - or stay back if you want to lead.

No Problem on my side - I thought you needed to visit each camera, so it would take longer.

I'm certainly not complaining to have more friendlies around during our visit in the Warrens.

@Gilga, @Beta, did AM and Tamarind go inside the talismonger or did they stay outside with Mato? Wondering for RP purposes.

Gilga mentioned in a post that AM is accompanying Bobby to the talismonger.

Bye
Thanee

Ah yes, thanks for the reminder.

@beta Let me know about Tamarind.

Sorry, I'd been following along this week but hadn't seen anything too urgent to respond to, but I should have said if she was going inside.

@Gilga: You can buy reagents. 50 drams would be 1,000¥.

Bye
Thanee

Yeah, I will update her sheet soon.
I figured it would be a nice way to tip the woman for her help. (and perhaps now that I'll have them I'll use them).

Don't you need reagents for your rituals, anyways?

Bye
Thanee

Quite a lot if we want to set up a temporary lodge for rituals

I haven't used rituals much since the start of the game, though.


Hacking(personas): 23d6t5 4
Hacking(personas): 21d6t5 10 (took only 21 dice but it doesn't matter).

Her skill: Hacking 8 + persona speciality 2 + logic (augmented)+ 9 + code slinger (hack on the fly) 2 + hot sim 2 = 23 dice.

It may not be very clean, but she'll have access to the link.

Okay, so next stop is the other Talismonger?

And continue with the traffic camera footage in the meantime, I suppose.

Bye
Thanee

pretty much.

You could definitely follow the tracks of their vehicle to the 168th (and then going east).

Bye
Thanee

I don't know about anyone else, but I'd gotten turned around. I'd thought that the team's route into the city was following the direction that the abductors' (?) vehicle had gone. But looking again at the map I now realize that The Horse Trot Ranch is north of Denver (the ranch is listed in the 'locations' on the map). The 168 runs west-east, so when their vehicle had turned east they were headed toward the town of Brighton, which is not necessarily the shortest route into Denver (but the roads are mostly on a grid and Denver is big, go east or west from the ranch and you'll find north-south roads that run into the city.

If not before then, there should be cameras when the 168 runs along the north edge of Brighton, and we should probably check those, as well as possibly cameras on the higways running towards the Plattesville and Keenesburg crossings back into Sioux territory.

Hmm, I had it backwards too. I thought that they had turned west, but going back and reviewing the IC thread I see that they turned east:


That said, I think all the points that Bobby makes are apt. They were professional enough while they were on the Ranch that it stands to reason that they would be similar cautious about covering their tracks on the way out.

I am reading the curse description:

CURSE
(MATERIAL LINK, SPELL)
A Curse allows an illusion spell to be cast on a subject
through a material link rather than a mystic link from
observing the subject. A Curse can be used on any target,
whether within visual range of the leader or not,
provided there is a link to the target. If the spell applies
to multiple targets, such as in a mass spell, then
the ritual must have a link to each of the targets.
The link is used as part of the offering and is effectively
destroyed during the ritual. The spell is cast normally
(using teamwork, if applicable) with all the tests
and Drain appropriate to the chosen illusion spell (step 6
of Ritual Spellcasting).
For the ritual's duration, a link is present between
the target and the ritual group while the spell portion is
sustained. It is possible to spot the link and use it to track
back to the ritual team’s physical location.
This ritual requires (Force) hours to complete

The last paragraph describes a link between the target and the ritual group -- does that mean we can also follow that link even if we do a less pink mohawk curse than a giant arrow? I mean if they can follow us - why can't we do the same?

Of course, that link works both ways.

Bye
Thanee

Alright if I understood correctly.

We'll need to
1. create a magical lodge (say F3) which would take 3 hours and 3 reagents.
2. Perform an F3 curse ritual.
3. Do the ritual - 11 dice vs. 6, 3 more hours, so overall, 6 hours.

6 reagents,
Ritual will succeed with 2 net hits.
Ritual spellcasting: 11d6t5 2
Ritual spellcasting 2: 6d6t5 0

resist drain:
resist drain: 11d6t5 3

no drain.

Moved things along in line with Tamarind's plan, but didn't want to push things too far without giving the GM the opportunity to say what happens (if anything) overnight.

Does AM even know the Curse ritual? It is not listed on your sheet.

If she does, you will then also have to cast the actual spell. The ritual only allows you to target it via the matrial link.

Bye
Thanee

Part of the house rules we agreed upon is that you don't need to study basic rituals. The rituals on her sheet are from before that.
This is, by the way, the first time rituals have come up as a solution to a problem. I used remote sensing for recreational use once in an interlude.



spell: 12d6t5 6
drain: 11d6t5 3

Ahh... I seel.



Well, you got to find uses for it, not wait for them to appear. But, I can certainly see how Ritual Spellcasting is a bit more of a niche. It surely has its uses, though.

Bye
Thanee

Not that it wasn't a waste of time now

Not entirely. You did learn something, at least. And there is something else you could possibly figure out with how the ritual went.

Bye
Thanee

Doesn't Trinity actually have four members?

Jackhammer
Diva
Deimos
Frost

No, just the first three are actual members. Frost was in the past, but is not anymore. He was their leader, actually, but passed the torch over to Jackhammer at some point.

Bye
Thanee

Some rolls.

General perception (for the radar sensors and as a base for the other rolls): Intuition 6 + Perception 5: 11d6t5 4 hits
+ bonuses specific to vision: Specialization 2 + Vision Enhancement 3: 5d6t5 3 hits (7 total)
+ bonuses specific to hearing: Specialization 2 + Audio Enhancement 3: 5d6t5 3 hits (7 total)
+ bonuses specific to smelling: Specialization 2 + Olfactory Boosters 4: 6d6t5 3 hits (7 total)

Wow, such consistency. Well that should be a pretty solid start.

Also going to roll Mato's Business (Agriculture) knowledge skill because when else am I going to use it? Logic 5 + Business 5 + Specialization 2: 12d6t5 4 hits

What is the surrounding area like? Residential, commercial, industrial, agricultural, etc. Trying to gauge how dense/populated this place is.

Everyone on vacation already?

I'm here.

If you want to wait for the Hardpan to open and pursuit different directions first, I definitely need some more input on what you want to do and how.

If you want to approach Frost, you would need to know how to reach him first. Or if you want to figure out how to find the bar's owner during the day, how would you do that?

Of course, there is the time to be considered as well... the current scene at the bar is happening while AM is still busy with her ritual.

So, maybe we should just move forward to something like 9 am, where everyone is back together and got some rest?

Bye
Thanee

The bar isn't open until 1600 so we're definitely not sitting around cooling our heels until then.

Getting some rest so that we can regroup and everyone can be together sounds like a solid plan. We can visit the other talismonger shop in the morning, which I think had more traditional business hours.

If we have time to kill we can talk to Frost, but the current thinking is that The Trinity weren't involved so this would be more like crossing them off the list. Since we have his real name, maybe we can cross-reference any publicly-available information (if such a thing exists in 2079) to figure out where he might be.

A computer search might be useful here - though that would be AM's area of expertise.

re: in game I've not said anything about the current investigation because I've already indicated that Tamarind went back to bed after setting some drones on watch. But also that she sent some drones with Mato and is on call for any needed drone shenanigans.

======================

unrelated to the current game, despite having three ShadowRun Seattle books already (the original from back in the day, I picked up the 5e box and was rather disappointed so then I picked up the 4e one on pdf to find out more about what had changed), I recently bought the 6e Seattle book. And I find it to be quite good?!? It is set around a year post independence, so well in advance of where we are with SIS, but lots of things haven't changed that much over a few years, and it is mostly pretty good about giving timelines of when things changed. Plus a table of travel times from one part of the plex to another (although they looked a bit long to me?)

So if you were considering picking it up, this is one up vote for it.

In particular it takes a bit of a different slant on Bellevue, SIS's new home, than I'd noticed before. From nicknaming it "The Belle" to stating that it has been accumulating "micro-arcologies" that are sometimes aligned more around a social experiment than a governing corp, it seems to have worked hard not to just re-tread the usual "rich, with high security" take on the city. So if anyone else does have or picks it up, I'd be interested in discussing to come to a reasonably aligned view on Belleville as it is in the SIS timeline and how it is changing.

The only SR6 books I have are the Core Rulebook, The Third Parallel (PDF), and The Neo-Anarchist Streetpedia (the last one I got recently together with a small pile of SR5 books I got for a very good price).

Free Seattle is on my list of books to maybe get.

Bye
Thanee

Free Seattle is an "adventure" book. I put it in quotation marks because the "adventure" it offers is a barebones framework. It has shockingly few details and the runs themselves are often nonsensical. (One of the most painful points is when you take a submarine from the Tacoma docks to Council Island, namely from salt water to fresh water. It's possible but only by passing through the Ballard Locks, which would make the presence of any submarine ridiculously obvious. As a local, this one hurts my head.) I had high hopes for it but was quite disappointed in the end product. I actually enjoy the overall plot around Free Seattle, but the execution leaves much to be desired.

Beta is talking about Emerald City, and the timing is quite relevant to me. Two days ago I was scrolling through by eBay purchase history when I noticed that I purchased Emerald City on March 21st. "Wait, I bought that (exactly) four months ago?" I asked myself, having no recollection of it. "Well where is it?" Sure enough it had been set aside in a box and buried under other things where it became out of sight and thus out of mind.

Having rediscovered it so recently, I haven't gotten very far into it. But I'll renew my efforts now that Beta endorses it. I'll start with the chapter on Bellevue and see if I have any thoughts on it.

Right. Emerald City. My bad! Not very familiar with the SR6 stuff.

Bye
Thanee