This thread is a continuation from this previous post

Great suggestions and here I was concerned that no one would response; you guys proved me wrong and I thank you. Now on to your suggestions.

Possible targets
I think a corporate decker is the way to go for the following reasons.

1. They are easy to find, they must have permits and permits are a matter of public records.
2. Corporate decks will be insured, so they are far less likely to come after me.

Step 1: Locate possible Marks … not Mark the decker
As to how, I have already mentioned the first step; looking up permits. In order to be a licensed decker you need three permits, one of which is 5 to 10 percent of the cost of the deck! Since my character is going after a “Novatech Slimcase-10” quality deck( 960,000 Y and availability of 18), I can pin-point who in Seattle will have this.

Step 2: Find out where they work
Finding this information is about as easy as the permits, because in order to get the permits they have to be employed and in most cases the companies are the ones paying for the permit anyway.

Question for you guys
Can you come up with a list of companies that would be on the list? AA companies? High end A companies? I have no clue here. Furthermore, I want to nudge my GM in a direction away from BIG names. Do you agree that think smaller (i.e. easier) companies would have a top end deck as well?

Step 3: Narrow the list to do-able targets.
Now this step can be done in two ways as I see it; or a combination.

A. List companies with the weakest physical security.
As it happens, my character has a level 2 contact who is a Security Risk Expert.  Here is the part I really like and I think my
GM will appreciate.

To reflect the difficulty of narrowing the search, my TN for my contact is the same as it would be to get the deck normally; TN=18.
Do you agree this is a nice simple way to do this?

B. Do a psychological profiling on the deckers for exploitable traits.
This one I am less sure about, because it could get complicated.

I would need to enlist the help from my decker contacts to get personal/medical records of the deckers and then analyze it. … yes, my character already has decker contacts, but I want my character to become a decker.

What do you guys think so far?

Ps: In the end I want it to be a cool run and hopefully a run the whole group can do, but cool is the most important part. Something along the lines of this
Mercer's quote
[quote]Sophie wouldn't steal a deck, she'd get the decker to give it to her.[\quote]

PSS Drraagh: I haven't seen "The Sterenko Job, Season 3, Episode 3", but I'll have to check it out.

Thanks again everybody.

They must have permits if the corp is non-extraterritorial, sure (but not if they are extraterritorial!), but that doesn't mean they'll be public record—do you have any source for this? My guess is that you'd be making an additional run against a government facility to obtain records on the permits (and you need to do this before you get the deck—oh, the irony). Beyond that, there's a good chance that the permit would be held by the corporation rather than the decker for a legit corp deck. You'd need to get someone with a good reason to take their deck home with them (and then they need to not live in corp housing) for them to be likely to have a personal permit.

Also remember that licensed cyberdecks will lack a Masking chip, meaning you'll need modifications and expense after you get the deck.

(Also be careful with the "it's insured" assumption; at this level and targeting only A-levels and lower it's probably true, but remember that the AAAs control so much of the world economy that their operations are essentially uninsurable)


As above, I doubt this.


You're unlikely to get any info on anyone working for an AA or bigger, so you'll only be finding A-levels or lower. High-end decks are reasonable for security deckers and high-end programmers (for the "double the required memory" programming bonus); still, you need to be going very high-end for the Slimcase to be an advantage over the significantly-cheaper Highlander. There are probably a few; I don't know that there are any obvious candidates that are nameable.

Also, both sorts of decks (security decker decks and programmer decks) are likely to be in highly-secure areas, not so much because of the value of the deck but because the security decker is, well, security personnel and a programmer's deck will have valuable data on it. This could be useful insofar as you could then probably sell the data, but it adds an extra obstacle that you don't need for your primary objective.

Edit: also, you may want the list function instead of manually indenting things.

~J

Your targets will indeed mostly be security deckers and programmers. Security deckers will obviously be more handy, because their rigs are closer to your needs. Most big companies will have in-house security, but most smaller companies can't afford that, so they'll contract out - and that means there's a call for outside contractors. If you can hire contractors to come to your house, with their decks, and scan your local network, that would seem to meet your requirements. Because their contractors, they aren't protecting valuable data, and because they want to show off and get you to pay more money, using high-performance hardware isn't unreasonable. These guys advertise, so you don't need to do much data searching. The tough part is making a convincing show of yourself, because they do their research.

Honestly? In what kind of game do you expect that anyone will be okay with the loss of a million nuyen piece of hardware? That's not the kind of thing that a Corp who can afford such gear is going to ignore, or give up on easily.

You are looking to snag a million nuyen worth of gear, for free. IF your GM goes for this, it should be a really significant run, unless your team is so awesome that it routinely gets million nuyen payoffs for their runs...



While I agree that you want this to be a run for everybody, and it should be a significant run, if you are simply capable of getting people to give you that kind of money, why are you even running the shadows?

Assuming there is some sort of logical answer to my previous question, what sort of compensation are your fellow runners receiving for this run?

Edit to add something constructive to the critical - As far as Kage's point about the "double the required memory" programming bonus, I was always under the impression that it would be far more beneficial to the corp to handle that through a server or mainframe, rather than individual decks. That way more than just one programmer could benefit from the resource, and it is also more secure, physically, because carting away a mainframe is going to be significantly more difficult than carting away a cyberdeck.

I find it unlikely that A and lower corps are going to have such hardware, but if they do, they aren't going to have many, and they will be highly secured (like any incredibly valuable asset), which almost certainly means breaking into a corp compound, because only an idiot would let the security decker take such valuable hardware off-property. If he does so, it is likely with a security escort, and probably only to travel between secure sites.

As far as locating decks and their users, that information is unlikely to be in any sort of publicly available database, unless they are governmental employees. As Kage said, extra-territoriality pretty much means the corps don't need to make that sort of thing available. As mentioned above, that's the sort of thing you'd need a decker for. This possibly could be accomplished by your decker contacts, possibly for a non-trivial fee, depending on the contact's loyalty to you. I like your proposed system for locating said deck. That seems like it would work, as long as said GM is free to impose further penalties to the roll if you only restrict your search to A corps and below (mainly due to scarcity).

At the end of the day, this seems like it should be a difficult, costly, run. Your fellow runners need some sort of compensation, as well, so keep that in mind when pitching this. Perhaps you dole out half a million to pay your fellows, and grease the palms of your decker contacts to get you the info you need. At the end of the day (if you succeed), you're still up roughly half a million worth of gear, which is still incredibly profitable.

That said, I hope you work out something that you, the GM, and the other players find to be fun. Please forgive any heat in my comments, because I've significantly bad experiences with players who feel entitled to "something for nothing", so that may be coloring my response here.

If I was gonna try my first step would be get some names, perhaps a temp job at a likely company. I still think your better off getting something built for you. But if you must get it, nothing wrong with a corp job. So next is to see how they keep ahold of their equipment, its not impossible they may just get check out at the office. If thats the case no problem just put something in somebodies coffee and slip out with their hardware, all it costs you is time and a decent fake SIN. If not once you have a name just go about grifting old school.

Significantly more than that, actually; if it's a security deck it'll have utilities, while a programmer's deck will hold paydata (and maybe still some utilities).



My interpretation is that the mainframe bonus is separate from the double-required-memory bonus, and that you don't get the latter unless your terminal has the memory regardless of whether you're using a mainframe's programming environment. I do think that a lot of corp cyberdecks, especially for programmers, are probably bolted in place, though.

~J

I haven't dug through my books in a while, so I may be mis-remembering, but I don't think those two were stackable. That said, if you're just after that memory bonus, you don't need a nova-hot, top of the line deck. You just need to put more memory in a decent one. And memory costs are pretty low, as I remember. Looks like I need to dig around a bit and re-read.

Once again great suggestions and advice, I think I am getting close to a solid plan with your guys help. Even when you guys point out the flaws or question my assumptions it only helps; as long as it is done constructively.

So now on to your comments

From Kageetenshi,

As a matter of fact I do. To my surprise after 5 mins of searching I was able to create a list of 475 people with private security licenses. I was able to get their license#, location, name and more. In the same search I also learned that according to “Chapter RL 34 FIREARMS AND OTHER DANGEROUS WEAPONS” that under regulation “RL 34.01 General conditions relating to carrying a firearm. (1), subsection g”, that “The owner or employee complies with all federal or state laws or local ordinances when carrying a firearm.” This means of course that the employee and not solely the company, must be licensed.

So in short, it is easy to get this kind of information … I didn’t know this until you asked the question, thanks Kageetenshi.


As it turns out both the company and employee must have permits/licenses.


This is also easy to find out based on the type of license; type 2 allows for use and transport.


In most, but not all cases. Corporate deckers can get permits or licenses to legally have evasion and masking, mat. Pg 21.


Why do you think this? In order to be a corporate deck (i.e. legal) you must have the permits and to get the permits you have to be employed (SR3 p273). Your employment information of course would be on your SIN, which isn’t hard to search for (mat pg 129). While what I found isn’t exactly the same as the SR3 version, don’t you think I have gone through enough work to earn a shot at it, regardless of the ultimate reality?

From Nezumi,

Now we are talking!

From IcyCool,

Before I address your points, let me first ask … what is with the hostility? Now on to your less then constructive comments

Who would be “ok” with losing a million nuyen piece of hardware? The point of going after someone with insured decks is that they will be “more ok” with it then somone not insured.


Again the point of insuring something is EXACTLY for cases like theses, assuming such insurance exist. Furthermore, no business without money to burn, which is a oxymoron, is going to waste money searching for a deck when given a replacement; assuming of course there isn’t sensitive data or whatever to recover.


This of course is the best part of your replay … you do see the irony in what you wrote right? Are you suggesting that when you steal something you shouldn’t get it for free??
On the other hand if you are strictly speaking from a game point of view, all I need to ask “what is your problem?” This is a game and it is meant to be fun. You act has those I am expecting my GM to give it me, while completely ignoring this ENTIRE process I am going through to get it. If anything what I am doing to steal a deck is more work then rolling against the availability … assuming my character even had the money.


I most cases I would agree, but not in all cases. If a player as gone through all of this work and it doesn’t break the game balance, why should it “have” to be hard? Again you are assuming additional payment is needed. If a player pays it smart, they should be rewarded not punished. Again this is a game that is supposed to be fun.

“you are simply capable of getting people to give you that kind of money, why are you even running the shadows?”
I don’t know what kind of games you play in, but characters can have more reasons to be a Shadowrunner then money. Besides the ultimate payoff is not what my character gets, but the fun I, the GM and everyone else has.

In the end IcyCool thanks for your more constructive comments.

Marcus
“I still think your better off getting something built for you.”
My character doesn’t have millions or anything even close to that, not even enough to hire someone to build it either. Furthermore, my character doesn’t have the skill, programming 10 to make the deck happen. While you are right that paying someone else to make it would be cheaper, it would also be a lot less fun.

That's, um, not actually a source I mean, the fact that modern-day private security licenses are a matter of public record certainly shows that it isn't unreasonable for them to still be, but UCAS law is not US law.



Not quite—in order to be a corporate deck in UCAS territory, you need to do the above. If they're working for AA or above, by definition they work on extraterritorial property. As long as they don't take the deck off-grounds, they need only comply with the AA-or-bigger's laws, and even if that involves permitting it won't be stored in the UCAS permit databases.


The text implies that Mainframe and Programming Suite bonuses are not stackable, but makes no connection between the Double Memory and Mainframe bonuses that I can find.


Active Memory is 7.5¥/Mp, so all of a bit less than ¥4k to kick Active Memory of a Highlander up to equal a stock Slimcase. That's, um, cheaper than I remembered. I guess the only reason for a fancy deck other than doubling as a Security Decker is to run a high-powered programming suite (you know, if you don't have access to a mainframe…). So much for that thought.

~J

I didn't read the other thread: why can't you just mug a decker? Or buy one?

Oh come now that just wouldn't fit the Idiom.

Well, I was just wondering if the campaign was 'corp deckers only' or something wacky.

I remember setting up a run to steal a Fairlight Excalibur. I tried running it over in the play by post forums a couple of times, but it never got very far.

The following is some hopefully constructive help from my prior toils.

It IS true that cyberdecks are sold over the counter in the future. I'd compare it to how computers and electronics are currently sold. These retail venues must get their stock from somewhere, most likely a distribution warehouse. The distribution warehouse likely gets its inventory direct from the manufacturer at some time. (A megacorp could sidestep this in a way, but likely follows something similar in that they have factories all over the place specialized in producing one product, a part for products, or a related line of products. IMO, the megacorp is still going to ship these by the truck/train-car load from the factory to a distribution center where they will be sent on with hundreds of different products to a retailer, again by the truck load.)

Back to getting the cyberdeck...

You could hijack a truckload from the factory. (Just think of the guy who had a problem with you stealing ONE worth Millions when you are now planning on stealing hundreds or thousands.) There must be some way they get shipped that avoids having them constantly hijacked, so we will avoid trying to steal the cyberdeck at this point. I also think trying to steal one from a retail location is going to get messy because of all the other shoppers and store security in general.

This leaves two targets: the truck from the distribution center to the store and the distribution center/warehouse. The truck is going to have less security. But you have to stop it, know its route, and, the biggest problem, WHEN it will be loaded with your booty. The warehouse will be presumed to almost always have what you want in stock, no customers/civilians to get in the way, and even perhaps less security than the retail store. (From my experiences working in retail for 15 years and visiting warehouses for 5, I realize thieves hit retail because it's in their neighborhood, not because it has a better return for the risk.)

Hence, my prior run I tried playing - The Warehouse Job. I know this is going down a different path than you were on, but on your path the simplest way to steal a deck from an individual would be to hire deckers until you find the type you desire and geek the decker. As a GM, I'd rather see you robbing a warehouse. Ditto in regard to Reputation.

Not tough enough to mug a decker and can't afford one.

I think it's a mistake to analogize cyberdecks (at least, anything remotely high-end) as consumer computers/electronics. A better comparison would be something of more equivalent cost. … Like a yacht.

Kage addressed this quite well, but just to reiterate: Extraterritoriality means they are effectively their own sovereign nation. To put it in a modern day context, this would be less like stealing from Microsoft, and more like stealing from a foreign embassy.

That's the catch you seem to be missing here. It's also why I suggested a governmental target, as you might be able to more readily access some of that information as a non-decker.



However, there is very little reason for them to do so. The only use for masking is to hide from other icons in the system. Since the only real reason to do that is to avoid triggering IC and system alerts, there is no reason for the programmer to have it, and only a marginal reason for a security decker to have it (if for some reason their defense strategy involved the security decker hiding from and just watching an intruder; He'd be better off simply crashing them).



So long as the cost of recovering a resource wasn't more costly than the resource itself, I can't fathom why you wouldn't think a corp would both collect the insurance, and send a corporate recovery team (or better yet, hire some cheap deniable assets, like Shadowrunners!) to quietly retrieve the stolen goods as well. It's good for the bottom line, which means it's good for the Corp.



Not exactly, no. There are many types of costs, including risk of injury, imprisonment, etc. Nothing is "free".



*shrug* That game works both ways you know. For example, "You act as though your GM should simply reward you with top of the line gear just for planning a heist."

But hey, as long as the game is fun for you, the GM, and the other players, go nuts for donuts man.



If acquiring a million nuyen worth of hard to get gear isn't game imbalancing for your game, then you're right. If your group routinely receives millions of nuyen for your runs, or is paid in truckloads of assault cannons and move-by-wire 4 cyberware, and is packing AV ammo as standard, then you are absolutely right. If your team is really that bad-ass, then you are playing a much higher power level game than I had assumed, my quibbles are pretty null and void then. Is that the kind of power level you are playing at? If you had a decker in your group, could it be safely assumed that they would have that kind of gear at this point in your campaign?

I should probably state that if game balance isn't a factor in the fun you and your group get out of the game, then feel free to completely ignore my advice. But the reason I'm hitting this point particularly is that it is very easy to get excited about something like this, and think that your GM and group will love it, but when you try to put this plan into action, you may find that your GM and group aren't as excited about it as you. So you should definitely talk to your GM about it, if you haven't already.



Like I said above, if everyone in your group is having fun, that's what is important.

I note you didn't mention anything about what sort of compensation your fellow runners would get for helping you out with this. Any ideas on that?



Ah, I was mixing those up then. Memory is right around what I thought it was though, which means that those top of the line decks in the hands of smaller corps is a very rare thing indeed.

Mardegun, I've got the Corporate Security Handbook at home, I'll dig around there and see if I can find anything more about what sort of hardware and software corporate security deckers are packing. If nothing else, it might give you a good idea of what sort of utilities he'll have loaded on his deck.



Actually, given the value of the gear we are talking about versus the value of a Yacht in SR3, a better equivalent would be 4 yachts.

Don't you people watch Leverage? Even if the corp doesn't want the deck, the insurance company does.

Yep, I've been in lots of games where NPCs chased our PCs for taking stuff way less valuable.

Yep, which is why I suggested that this is a major deal. Heck, the GM could stretch this sort of thing into an entire campaign arc if he was so inclined.

This kind of run shouldn't be a milk run. A milk run is called that, because at the end of it you come back with milk, not the Hope Diamond.

Hehe, 4 yachts, then.

Thanks for the information it is helpful. I hadn't ful thought about the warehouse, because it isn't my character's style, but it does fit the style of the group better.

As a side note, I really had no plans on geeking a decker, again that wouldn't be my character's style.

Actually, in a corporate setting, i would argue quite the contrary. At least where I work, we dont pay for software - we pay for software licenses. Our installation files are available on a network drive for the IT help desk to install as many copies as they want, but they either have an enterprise-wide license, or a limited number of concurrent licenses. Either way, the software on the stolen deck will be worth relatively little to the parent corporation unless licenses are tied to computers, and cant be untied in case of loss (which seems suspicious).

Additionally, the deck will be worth LESS than the book cost. I assume these super-high-end decks are largely custom-made to fit a particular purpose. When you have software or computer hardware thats in that price range, a large part of that is in the service of customizing to meet customer needs. There is a fair chance that the corporation has enough regular need for these that they have some or all of that skill in-house, which is a significant reduction in price. And we know it doesnt have a masking chip, so thats another reduction in price.

We also arent getting it for free. If were talking about a corporate decker, youre going to be spending money to create a fake identity, to woo the decker, or more likely, creating an entire false front. THat isnt cheap. Lets say youre going to stand up your own corporate office. You need to spend money to register your corporation, or to buy a pre-registered corp from someone else. You have to make some bribes to make sure the thing doesnt look like it was set up yesterday by someone off the street. You need to cook the books, and you need books to cook. You need to rent out space to operate. You need a crew of at least three, most likely five or six, to make the situation believable. You need a contract to show them, which has to pass legal. You need a computer system for them to secure (even if youre just renting it - although how youre going to do that is beyond me, since most likely the system will cost more than the deck youre stealing). And all of this hinges on having absolutely BULLETPROOF SINs. Id guess for a pair of $400k decks, youll be putting out about $200k. Not a bad ROI, until you account for the probability and costs of failure.

Hey Cool,
Actually you seem to be confused, but I’ll accept my part in confusing you. I understood his point perfectly, because if you notice I don’t directly state I am targeting extraterritorial companie . In any case, the point is this …

Whoever comes up on the permit search is a potential target. If the GM declares that extraterritorial companies don’t show up on the list, I am not going to argue they should. Besides those targets in most cases are going to have better security anyway.



While I agree that very few people would need this, clearly some people do. In fact, I am sure if we thought about it we could come up with reasons why.

You make a good point, but you also help prove my point. Clearly targeting a company that has extra money to spend on recovery team is less desirable. There could be companies who are just getting by and can’t afford recovery teams or at least ones of a quality.

Regardless don’t get me wrong, I assume that people will try to retrieve the deck. Whether they are the wronged company or the insurance company it doesn’t matter. The important part is picking a target that doesn’t have enough resources directly or indirectly to catch me.


If nothing is free, then why did you accuse me of trying to get it for free? Why bring it up at all? Honestly, my response was meant as a joke and play on your words.

You are being overly dramatic. All starting deckers can start with a deck worth ¼ of million neyun. On the other hand, a starting character could have this “game unbalancing deck”, assuming the GM doesn’t care or know about the availably at character generation. Assuming the game I play in unbalanced, is just that an assumption, which isn’t true.
Besides as others have already pointed out there are other ways to balance this deck IF the run were successful.


Very wise advice and yes I have already brought the subject up with him. Funny thing is it was one of my fellow players who suggested doing this.

Once I and the GM have a better idea on how or if this is possible, then it would be worth considering team payment.


That would rock and thanks!


I agree it shouldn’t be easy, however I disagree that it should be hard just to be hard. The difficultly IMO should match it’s worth, which is signifcant. However I am still not sold that only extraterritorial companies would have such gear. If you can "buy it off the shelf", it shouldn't be impossible to steal it. Especially as someone pointed out, if you know where to steal it. There is always a weak point and that is what I am trying to do.

It was partly confused by the fact that you didn't seem to know that the defining feature of an AA corporation is extraterritoriality. Now you know, and knowing is half the battle.


Right, but it's already necessary to invoke Monkeyright. Corporate licenses are difficult to reconcile with Monkeyright and doing so has no advantage in realism, since monkeyright.

~J

That is indeed a compelling argument. You may have me there.

In regards to recovery, recovery is an odd beast. IRL, it's rarely a function of effectiveness or value of the loss (computer security never is). Recovery especially is a kicking dog because it's used so rarely, but it's such a scary thing. With diverse corporations, they'll already have physical security assets which they'll rely on. Not-so-diverse corps may contract it out, use cute toys, or so on. I'm not aware of any current, IRL procedures most people follow for recovery, so from a modern setting, it would be up to the manager, which may get some odd responses. SR probably has covered it more, but those manuals benefit from confidentiality, so they won't be available to everyone, and it's still written by a manager somewhere, who may prefer toys or physical tactics rather than a balanced approach. So as GM, I would feel at liberty to throw anything I want - trail-sniffing bloodhounds, a cyberzombie, a goofy backtracing program hidden in the hardware, the device explodes, whatever. Some will be avoided if the corp believes the asset was lost, let's say in the fire, and some won't be. How effective and balanced the approach is (and if there is one at all) depends on who is overseeing it.

Thanks again everyone for helping.

Sorry it took me so long to get back to you, Real Life™ intrudes.

I dug through the Corporate Security Handbook, and found it pretty light on significant details for corp deckers (it focused pretty heavily on Building Security Riggers). What I did find regarding the corporate security deckers that it put out there is that they are usually Professional Rating 3-4 (the Handbook is 1st or 2nd edition, not 3rd), and they are supposed to have a cyberdeck with an MPCP of roughly double their professional rating, as well as a decent program loadout for such a deck. So that looks like it'll be a CMT-Avatar-7 or a Renraku Kraftwerk-8.

Given just how cheap memory upgrades are for Cyberdecks, there is pretty much no reason for a small company to shell out for a top of the line deck when they could just pick up a much cheaper deck and double its memory for pennies in comparison. Again I'll push my "government" angle, as governmental agencies will often spend wastefully (and as such, may actually have some expensive decks where it doesn't make sense to have them), whereas a company actually has a bottom line that it needs to manage.

So what you are looking to get seems to be rare in the extreme, to me. As a GM, the only way I'd honestly entertain your plan is if there wasn't a decker in the group, and my future plans for runs involved some decking that I'd like to see party members do.

But I'm not your GM, so hopefully you can convince him to go with your plan. Keep us posted on how it turns out, I'd love to hear how your plan plays out. Good or bad, it will surely be entertaining.

I'd argue that this is flipped—governments are weak things with serious issues acquiring resources (who are they going to tax for funding, the extraterritorial megacorps?), while the Big Ten control over half of the global economic output and are thus prepared to burn money on things.

Smaller corps operate on a more constrained budget, but then they don't need to engage in chest-puffing against other countries.

~J

A fair point. I have to admit I'm taking my government spending from today's world, not the Sixth World. So I may be dramatically overestimating governmental spending in the sixth world.

That aside, my main point in this whole thing is that while the plan to "steal a cyberdeck" could be a solid one (and a lot of fun!), the target is what I don't understand. Mardegun's plan assumes far too much, I think. The whole idea is to steal a top of the line cyberdeck, but instead of going for targets that would logically have such a resource, Mardegun is making a whopper of an assumption that some simp working for a small corp is going to be toting hardware that doesn't make sense for the corp to even think about buying. And this isn't some small piece of the plan, mind you, it is the central core around which the entire plan is built. That's where I'm having trouble with this plan.

Given Mardegun's stated main objective (The plan and run has to be cool above all else), I'm not sure what I'm missing. Because as I read it, the plan isn't so much about stealing a novahot piece of SotA gear from a target that would logically have such a piece of gear, but more about the equivalent of finding a novahot piece of SotA gear on the ground. Sidestepping all the actual, logical challenges in accomplishing such a task by making the monumental assumption that you can find an easy to steal, relatively consequence free deck removes all the "cool" from the plan (at least to me).

"This just in, world-class grifter easily parts a well-insured bufoon from his money (who shrugs while a *wa-wa-waah* sad trombone sound plays), but we'll put something interesting on the news at 11."

Fortunately, my need to have things make at least a modicum of sense does not apply to Mardegun's game. I hope he and his GM work something out that the players find to be incredibly cool. And I hope we get to read about it here on Dumpshock. I think the base idea has the potential to be a great one, and am a huge fan of Leverage, so I'm looking forward to reading about how Mardegun's plan turns out.