The Politicians Are Plotting
The Orks Are Restless
And the World Is Changing Around You

The New Season of Shadowrun Missions—
Welcome Back to Seattle

The newest season of the Shadowrun Missions campaign takes players back to Shadowrun’s hometown of Seattle, where they’ll visit some old haunts, see a few old faces, and play a role in shaping the future of the Emerald City! This season will feature two main plotlines for the characters to get tangled in. And they’re playing for more than just fun—their choices can affect the story.

One plot arc throws the characters in the hidden city that is Seattle’s Ork Underground; the other drops them in the swirl of activities surrounding the ongoing pursuit for the recovery of powerful magic artifacts.

Buried Underground puts runners in the middle of the fight over the future of the Ork Underground. The Ork Rights Coalition is demanding full district status for the Underground, and they’re quite willing to use violence to get their way. Kenneth Brackhaven and the government of Seattle are weighing the decision and adding their own hidden motives to the equation. Both sides in this side are more than willing to take out anyone who gets in the way of their plans. In this plotline, runners might run into:

William MacCallister—Shadowrunner Turned Fixer. Working for the O.R.C, MacCallister is driven by a thirst for vengeance for his brutally murdered daughter.

Dana Oaks—Metroplex District Attorney. Oaks is determined to crack down on the rampant crime in the Ork Underground. She doesn’t like shadowrunners, but she’ll use them is she needs to.

Athena Tatopoulos—KSAF Chief Editor. A mystery woman who hasn’t been seen in public in more than two years, Tatopoulos is focused on uncovering the real story behind the brewing showdown in the Underground.

Joe Martin—NewsNet Special Reporter. Martin looks and acts like a walking cliché of every trid news anchor, but his smarmy attitude covers up the heart of a real journalist, one who isn’t afraid to get in the trenches and dig for the real story.

---------------------------------

The Artifact Rush of 2072: The rush is on! The Draco and Atlantean Foundations are scrambling to get their hands on artifacts popping up around the globe and unlock their secrets, and the shadows are rife with opportunity as these two organizations look for support wherever they can get it. Meanwhile, two ancient creatures, who have the wealth and power of Wuxing and Saeder-Krupp at their disposal, look to find an opening to snatch artifacts for themselves. The shadows are crowded with people like:

Laurent Nazaire—Atlantean Foundation. A dwarf magician from Quebec, Laurent runs the Atlantean Foundation’s Seattle branch. Open, down to earth, and kind Nazaire and has the kind of squeaky-clean reputation that makes shadowrunners wonder what he’s hiding.

Arturo Corso—Draco Foundation. An eccentric, reclusive billionaire with one of the largest collections of rare books and magical artifacts on the planet, Arturo has recently partnered with the Draco Foundation to study the artifacts the Foundation is trying to acquire.

Simon Andrews—Saeder-Krupp. Andrews is a changeling and freelance magical consultant. Who looks like a man-sized bipedal lizard. And eats live mice. And, to top it all off, works for a dragon.

Lin Yao Chuang—Wuxing. An elven adept, Lin Yao is the great dragon Lung’s eyes and ears in Seattle. No one really wants to know what Lung plans to do with the information Lin Yao is feeding him.

Watch the CGL Shadowrun Missions site for more info!
http://www.shadowrun4.com/missions/index.shtml

THat's a little taste for Season 4. I can't give away anything more right now, but... Enjoy!

Also, grab a PDF version if you like here!

Holy Crap!
Plotty goodness.

Can't wait to see it in play.

BlueMax

But, but, I wanna play it now!!!!!

Ok, want it now! sounds like this is going to be fun. Sounds more like the old modules that got everyone going. I am looking forward to seeing this live up and exceed the hype I just read. Woo hooo ready to go!

From what I've seen of the missions so far, they are great and easily workable into any ongoing plotline a GM is running. The best thing about them from a GM's POV is that they come with prerendered stats! Woo-hoo!

And how long before this starts rolling out?

New interesting stuff like this is what I like to see and is hopefully comeing soon so I have a regular flow of stuff to run at the local game store and start to pull people back in again.

Yes I could always run other stuff at the store I make up but there are games running for that people want me to run Missions they have GM's for regular gameing.

My guess would be that some of it is rolling out at the Conventions now. As for how long before we get this at home, its anyone's guess.

Sucks to be a Best Coaster sometimes.

BlueMax

I'm going to have to defer to Bull on most of this stuff Casazil but I can assure you while the cons do have some really neat things going for them, the CMP's being a bit example, you shouldn't be far behind on the launch of the new season if you are behind at all. I'll leave further clarification to Bull.

Short Answer, not 100% certain yet.

Less short answer, it depends on a number of factors. The major one being, finishng the releases for Season 3.

Bull

Seriously, Seattle, again? One of the best things in SR4 is the broadened perspective so we're not imprisoned in The Only Sprawl.

There's so many other places we could go. Chicago, LA, or better yet, someplace outside North America. Am I really the only one who'd be more interested in Missions in Geneva or Nairobi or Istanbul than the same old same old?

Yes, I mad.

I'll be honest LA or staying in Manhattan for another season would have been my preference. But there are solid reasons for going to Seattle. Like it or not Seattle is kind of a lodestone for wierdness and provides unique opportunities because EVERY power in the game is represented. Additionally Seattle has a sourcebook on it, it has established sites and locations available to work with in detail that just arn't present elsewhere. From a writing perspective that's important.

Cities that have detailed information on them to varying degrees.

Chicago, Lagos, Seattle, Manhattan, Hong Kong, Some of the cities in Germany(But only if you have the german sourcebooks) London, (to some extent), Denver.

Those are your basic options off the top my head but people have made the complaint that they want SRM to be tied into current events in the SR world and perhaps actually affect those events. Since the bulk of the big events in SR are driven by North America the further you get from there the harder those tie ins become.

Just my two

As someone new to Missions (Denver only), when was the last calendar year Missions were run in Seattle? (Prior to Season Four)


BlueMax

Seasons 00 & 01 were run in Seattle for Missions also Virtual Seattle (the campain that was run before Missions) was in Seattle.

Season 02 was Denver and 03 is in New York.

As for other locations yes it would be cool to go other palces but.... as was said cities with material available on them should make for a better story less stuff to make up on the fly for said city.

Also I can say with out a doubt I know a good 30 to 40 people who would stop playing if Missions went to LA because of the whole drone cameras shoot everything idea and everyone wants to be recorded it's called Shadowrun not Publicrun.

Can anyone map these to Calendar years?

I played like two Virtual Seattle games but it felt like more than a decade ago.

BlueMax

Virtual Seattle was different from Missions, and were part of the RPGA. The RPGA stopped supporting non-D&D events back in... 2003? Shortly after D&D 3.0 came out.

Checking out Season 1 on the SR4 site, Mission 01-01 was Copywrite 2004. Denver was 2006, 2007, and 2008, I think. New York started up in 2008 and has been ongoing (the release of Season 3 has been much slower, unfortunatly).

Bull

Bull,
I had not of even heard about the first two seasons. Nor did I know they were available to download through the site.

New edition ever ~5 years, back to Seattle after ~5 years (Assuming Season 4 is for 2011)
And you don't have to worry about me asking for Season 3 to come out faster. My players read the Rotten Apple handout and opted out of said Missions in our home games.

Twould play them myself if there was enough Shadowrun support at local cons.
I even offered something like $50 for someone to run them locally so I could play.

BlueMax

Once a PC has played the first S4 mission, will they still be eligible to play the CMPs for Season 3 or will they be forbidden to ever go back, the way NYC locked a PC out of Denver?

Was that $50 per game?? If so, come to Hamilton, Ontario, and I will run 2 or 3 a day for you!

Yes, $50 per game. And to think, nobody nearby to take us up on the offer.
I would love to take you up but getting the group to you would exceed allowable costs.

BlueMax

Any archaeology jobs in San Mateo?

Marin County, 50+ km to the northwest, yes.
San Mateo, no.
Despite what the hipsters would tell you, San Mateo is just a burb.

BlueMax
/we could carpool to Marin

I checked it out. Lots of cool stuff in Marin County. Too bad I would have real trouble translating my work in Peru and Mexico into something that would get me hired there.

My only local experience is with digging up Shadowrunners... HEYOOO

And fault trenching.

BlueMax