Sounds weird I know but regular Butterflies will land on people to get the salt we have sweated out. So what about insect spirits of Butterflies that not only hunt metahumans for procreation but also to suck all the salt from their bodies? Kinda a salt vampire. Back ground: I am using the mission "Wetwork plain and simple" but transplanted to Hong Kong. The retreat the target is staying at is in the New Territories near Fung Yeng. Now the placement of said retreat is near a butterfly preservation location. So to make things more difficult for the runners I was thinking of having the targets, female joytoy in reality be a fleshform scout. Any ideas on powers such a spirit might have or which of the already existing insect spirits would make a good template?

That particular mission is easily the worst mission's scenario I've played. So I hope you change it a lot.

I'm guessing one of the solitary insect spirits. Butterflies don't have hives, do they?

Is the main insect shaman going to be based in any way on The Monarch?!? Because that seems like a natural, if silly, way to go.

The wiki page on Butterflies mentions that some have evolved symbiotic or parasitic relationships with ants and other social insects.

I'd also be tempted to have the butterfly's metamorphisis be a major trigger in the run.

Ancient History's site has an interesting page on Insect Spirits, including Butterfly.

Have kept alot of the run as is, except in Hong Kong rather than Denver but am dropping the snow storm section. What appeals is the limitations the Johnson has stipulated. Especially the "it has to look like an accident" one. For my players this is forcing them to be more thoughtful and to have a contingency plan that does not amount to "we have a rope". Any way was indeed thinking of the Butterfly spirit as more of a "loner" spirit rather than a hive one. The point is the location of the retreat lends itself to such a insect spirit inserting itself in the retinue of a powerful meta who will be able to get it into Hong Kong unnoticed. The spirits exsistance will probably only be exposed when or if the runners blow the whole "it's suppossed to be an accident" thing. Then if they don't manage to kill it she can be a reaccuring antagonist who is hunting them for thwarting her plans for any easy life.

sounds kinda like that one classic star trek episode . . The Last Of It's Kind ? *g*

Of course, depending on the players, it could easily veer off into an episode of The Venture Brothers

The issue we had was that they you have to come up with a plan and get all the gear to carry it out with limited data. So you go to try to gather data and decide on the plan. The more data you gather the less possible it looks and the more the good possibilities get removed. And it's so far from anywhere you have contacts you can't get more gear on site. And then after wasting 3 hours trying to design a plan (and ending up with 10 ghouls glued to the bed of the truck as the 'he got "accidentally" eaten by a pack of ghouls "plan"'), you find that it didn't matter.

I fully expect the run to become a f.u.b.a.r. but I am hoping it will get my team to start thinking of alternatives to mass destruction as a salution. Plus it will give them some exposure to insect totems which may be playing into another ongoing metaplot that is being discussed in the 28 Days Later thread, lol.

Suppose they do not killed you by draining you quickly, but stock pile you in a pantry, coming in for the occasional snack? Maybe this visit is another lick, or a kill or now they want to convert you.

I think we might have a new way to drive Snow Fox nuts. (She so hates bugs.)

I knew a Butterfly shaman from San Francisco... and he was fabulous.

One thing that I don't understand is why insect spirits have to behave in the same way and look as real insects. I mean why would the insect metaplane have anything in common with earth's fauna of insects? I have no problem with fire, water, earth or air metaplanes or the metaplanes of death or life, those concepts are general enough to have their own metaplanes. But if we have the insect metaplane, why not the mammal metaplane? Or the vehicle metaplane? What's so particular about insects that justifies having their own metaplane?

The way I see it: insect spirits are hideous, have in some cases a hive-like structure and appear on earth by parasiting living beings. That's fine, and since they have some insect-like features like mandibles, it is also reason enough for calling them "insect" spirits. What I don't understand is the general tendency to represent them as oversized caricatures of real insects. Wasp spirits, mantis spirits, spider spirits (a mortal enemy of other insect spirits, of course) or now butterfly spirits with their lovely wings. What's the logic behind that? Is there something in the background of SR that explains this, or is it simply because the idea of giant insect-like beings from another dimension that threaten to invade earth is a cool concept for an RPG?

FYI the Star Trek episode was titled "The Man Trap."

Flesh-form butterfly spirits inhabiting kittens!

The chattering extraplanar soul-destroying hordes have never looked cuter.

Well I introduced the Butterfly Insect spirits to my game. Players totally detest them, lol. Sense Butterflies, much like regular flies, like salt I had the butterfly flesh forms have a type of corrosive spit that dissolves human flesh leaving the salt behind untouched. Nothing better than a bunch of hotties turning out to be Flesh Forms that start throwing up corrosive fluid all over you and your team mates, lol. The ongoing corrosive nature of the spit led to some very interesting role playing.