I'm quite keen on playing with my players minds by running flashback encounters/missions but in SR3 when i ran it I cocked it up and never revisited the issue again.

Now few of the players i have have began the new campaign with "we know each other from before and have worked together..bla bla bla".

So we already have a job underway but i was thinking of interjecting Flashbacks to certain moments in their history that coined or tested their relationship. Now the problem im encountering is not the metagame and the potential to min max the flashback effect, but rather then mechanics to handle all normal events.

Lets say PC1 and PC2 met 2 years ago but they met PC3 a year ago and PC4 just joined the gang 6 months ago. On the cUrrent job PC5 entered the game so he is developing the relationship as we speak but the others should at least have some 'chemistry' right?

so what im having trouble with is how to represent the PC stats XXX time interval prior? Like say i want to run the moment where PC1 and PC2 established a relationship. Jump into flashback and say its some mini job. how do i reduce the stats to represent Plausible 'younger/less experienced' runners. Rebuilding with less BP is out of the question and current chars are BP built so dont want to try karmagen and work backwards.

I was thinking doing a -1 to one the top3 atribs for each year regressed and -1 to two of the top4 skills per year regressed.

Do you reckon thats too much? maybe make it every 2 year regressed or maybe not enough make it for every 6 months regressed?
whats a good cap though if you back far enough you end up with zeroes smile.gif maybe cap at Racial attrib start +2? and skill of 1?

What else can be affected? I know newer contacts may not be there and giving Free contacts from interactions in the Flashback can wreak havoc if the Face decides to min-max the mechanic.

Although could be a good mechanic to acquire stories for current contacts and even make the flashback as a bonus mechanic to boost certain contact stats regressively.

Am i playing with fire here again and waiting to be burned or you reckon its doable?

Now to keep everyone involved i was thinking of letting them join the flashback even if its NOT them in the past but rather assume the shoes of an NPC that was there part of the team and either use modified own stats or give them premade NPC chars. this leads to another problem. Karma awards. how to justify giving awards to players that played NPCs. so say 3/5 players playing NPCs at the time when PC1 and PC2 met or done something significant?

This sort of means that CURRENT time starting chars would eventually 'start' with extra Karma based on how 'experienced' they are.

I think its a nuke of problems waiting to explode but if anyone has ever pulled it off before I want to know and give it a go. Also if there is a decent mechanic to pull this off I may be able to regressively run premade adventures from SR3 maybe (thats a BIG MAYBE) smile.gif smile.gif