Absolutely and on a regular basis.

Runner teams looking for work are getting, in effect, job interviews. Each team is being presented to Johnson based (hopefully!) on their qualifications, then they have to win the guy over. Bidding wars are common, wipeouts from behavior happen, different crews build up rivalries, and your reputation grows or tanks for lots of reasons.

Johnson runs down a vague list of what he wants to do with half a dozen teams, easy, before finally selecting one from the pool.

So, yeah, if teh RUnners push for too much, or if they act goony, or they aren't respectful enough, or ... well, any number of things can keep them from ever getting the job.

Alright, so, you prepare a run, your players are looking forward to it, you let the meet happen, and the J turns them down. Then what? You wing over two weeks of downtime, get a new meet with a new J but the same run, because it's already prepared? In the meantime your playes have started peddling stolen goods because they have to pay for their lifestyles.

Basically, what should be happening is that there is a selection process behind the scenes: The J calls the fixer, and the fixer picks a team. That team is the group of PCs. And in order to let things fit together, it's your job as the GM to make sure to give them fitting runs, at least at this stage. You can't give a team without a hacker a matrix-heavy data-steal, nor can you give a team without a sam a brute-force extraction job. But that pre-selection should have happened by the time the team and the J sit down together. Anything else is icing on the cake, just a few tests to see whether the fixer did a good job in picking that team.

Just my opinion.

And how so? Seriously, you're playing a game. Do you, as the GM, tell your players "Sorry, we have to make new characters because your old ones checked out all the J's and now noone wants to hire you."?

As a player I would certainly protest.

I also think there are differences to the degree of checking people out. First, the fixer should have checked out the J. No J could hope to find a professional (i.e. reputed) team without being checking out. Only beginner teams get the newbie johnsons, unless they set themselves up like the A-team or something and specifically take jobs from non-professionals. Secondly, there are checks that don't need asking around or posting on message boards - in any case I would say that is the crudest method. But a matrix search with image recognition and other stuff should happen, IMHO. It's not like the J won't try to check out the team, too.

I think there's a fine line to walk, here: J's want the most professional teams for their high-risk jobs, but obviously they still want them to be a deniable or even disposable asset. There will be tons of rabble offering their services, but a capable team will be harder to find. And so what do you do? IMHO it's a virtual necessity to check out the J in a non-intrusive way. Johnsons that don't like this very soon won't find capable teams, or will have to pay a lot more for them. The equation works both ways. The fluff is full of manipulative Johnsons who have an agenda that will eventually lead to problems. Usually for that to work out well for the runners the GM has to pull punches, or else it never would end up good.

Look, the INITIAL story of the SR4 sourcebook is about a J double-cross. Sersiously, if that's not full indication that you're supposed to distrust the J, then what is?

Exactly. That's the whole point of a Fixer. The runners use them as their agents, finding jobs suitable to their talents. The Johnsons use them to find runners suitable to their jobs. If a Johnson gets a group that doesn't meet his requirements, or their Fixer keeps setting the runners up with idiotic jobs they never stood a chance of getting, then it's the Fixer's (aka, GM's) fault and his reputation is on the line. And considering that's the brunt of a Fixer's role, having a bad reputation for getting people together is obviously not good for business.

People have some really odd ideas about how this arrangement works.

Oh, and good luck with the facial recognition against the professional J who wears big sunglasses just to prevent such a possibility ...

Don't forget the misdirection, either. The Horizon Johnson might wear a conservative suit, the Ares Johnson might have a Japanese-cut suit and a Fuchi corporate pin, and the Aztechnology Johnson might sound like a good ole boy from Texas. Hacking their throwaway commlink or running their (disguised) face against a database might give misleading results, too.

Because it's hard to do anything quietly. I liked that they incorporated rules for this in Eclipse Phase, and they're very appropriate for SR.

Most full-time regular Johnsons SHOULD expect some level of them being checked out. As long as it's not too aggressive most should not overly mind, since they really should have already locked down any information about themselves they don't want getting out. All part of the job.

The Johnsons you have to watch for are the inexperienced ones. The guys who don't normally do this kinda thing, the ones that are just starting out, the guys who don't know how the game is played. Their reactions to the runners investigating them will be unpredictable.



-k

That hasn't been my position at all, Kirk, but maybe you chose not to keep up with the thread. Earlier, I specifically said that you can/should check into the Johnson *some*, but not excessively. The deeper you dig, the louder it gets. In addition, anonymity is the total function of a Mr. Johnson, so we can presume they're paying attention more than some random target, which presumably has many primary functions to worry about. The Mr. Johnson expects you to do the normal amount of checking, and probably has layers of identity specifically arranged for that purpose; no one said he'd wig out if you Google him.

All of these (and above) are valid, but that still doesn't mean you don't try to check him out. There are obviously lines you should not cross, unless you're really sure of yourself. Tagging him or his car, hacking the fixer for info, even hacking the J's disposable commlink. These sort of things I would not do, unless there is a reason. Magical observation is a finer line to cross. It's inherently passive and non-intrusive (as long as you're keeping astral overwatch, anyway), and undetectable, but probably provides some valid info for the case when you really do need to find the guy later, for instance via spirit search. You might also sweep the place of the meet afterwards (if you have the resources, that is) for stuff that might provide a magical link. And there isn't really a handle except politeness to stop you.

I'm never saying that you should necessarily get any info with these checks, but IMHO you should be doing them, nonetheless. As a GM, when I would want the players to know that they should be digging for more info, I should drop some hints.