It looks like our next mission is going to end in a double cross, but the pay is too good for us to reasonably pass it up (Corporate client, so we know they can afford the 50 grand each they're offering). They came to us through a former client rather than our fixer (Which sets off alarm bells all on its own...) and they say they're impressed with the job we did for their contact. So the question is: how do we make sure we get paid even if they do double cross us?

Obviously we demand half up front. That kind of goes without saying. Who can give me some ideas on how to ensure the other half is waiting for us when we get home?

Perhaps a lil more about the mission might help, is it something you have to deliver? perhaps something you can ransom back to them if they screw you? is it something that if they screw you, you can threaten to sell to a competitor? do your characters know the double cross is imminent? or is it pure player speculation?

Well I am playing a paranoid, so it's part in-character speculation...
The mission is to get a shipment of chemicals (We haven't been told exactly what, but I plan to do a lot of research on that) from Seattle to *Destination* safely, about a week's trip by boat. We're then supposed to take the boat back. We've been told to allow no delays and no damage to the cargo, implying that it's valuable (My guess is a new biological weapon, which explains the need for haste). At this point the double-cross is only a hunch, but consider:

1) The mission is hugely overpaid. a cargo run should not net 50 grand each for a 5-6 man team. I smell a rat.
2) No fixer. Our new employer turned up at the conclusion of our last mission and made his pitch, stressing the urgency of the run. That gives us limited time for background checks and digging in case this guy has a habit of doing this sort of thing.
3) Wrong job. A runner team working as a security crew on a freighter? Hmmm...

It may be my inner paranoid here, but it seems to me that a runner team would be a perfect test group for a new bioweapon, as they're specialists at staying alive come what may. I'm expecting that the group is walking into a weapons test with us as the guinea pigs...
Not an issue for me, as I'll be safely in Seattle hacking via sat uplinks, but for the rest of the crew it could be bad. Ironically, I'm the only one with any reservations about this mission. Go figure.

Get them Hazmat suits and see if they get the clue?

Great idea.
As I'm a hacker and only one of the other member of the group has bothered to maintain any form of matrix defense (The others all rely on her, I've only just joined up and our GM is still a bit new to the matrix rules so hasn't been using them much other than rigging) it shouldn't be hard to get everyone's addresses and have the hazmat suits delivered to their doorsteps.
I doubt they'll get the hint, though.

Contact the prior client. Get some bona fides from them. Oh, and make sure the former client doesn't seem to be stressed, worried, frightened, etc - IOW, doesn't seem to have been intimidated or blackmailed into saying "sure sure yeah it's all cool".

(Also, ask 'em why they're handing out your business cards or whatever, instead of calling you to arrange a meet on the third party's behalf.)

Old client runs a subsidiary under the new client, so I have my doubts about his reliability as a character witness.

Best suggestion to get paid is to mock up an identical crate to the one you're shipping, hack the manifest to make sure it gets sent to the same place, do some hack work to find out the details of the cargo if possible, if not, a phone call to your former client connected to a biometric reader (should be able to tell stress in the tone if you have a previous reading on them). Worst case scenario, mutually beneficial location, a static feed of the cargo connected to a hijacked Transpo drone. New client hands the credsticks off, team checks the sticks, they leave, you rig the crate into the room, giving the team time to escape, everyone gets what they want.

Sorry if I'm too paranoid.

Sounds good and paranoid to me, but unfortunately the mission kind of requires us to be in the same place as the cargo for most of the run while conveniently cutting off escape routes should things go pear-shaped and time pressure means that the only real chance we'll have to do our research will be when we're on route.
I'm fairly confident that we'll be able to get out of whatever we're walking blindly into, but making sure we get out money afterwards is the hard bit.

I'm thinking that maybe we should require that our pay is held for us by a neutral third party (IE a fixer we and the client both know and trust). The client can pay the fixer's fee.

sell the guy who wanted to stick you for spare parts and make it known.

If you smell a double-cross the smart thing to do is to find out the cargo, maybe even specifics of it, then sell it to the Client's competition for extra money, if they are going to double cross you might as well work on getting a way to make money as a back-up plan.

Yeah, but .... who's to say that the people hiring o to move those chemicals are who they claim to be ...? What if this is an elaborate payback, from the target of what you did for the old client? IOW: they tracked it back to them, applied pressure, figured out who did the actual dirty work ... and now they're moving on the revenge angle.

That'd be my guess.

Honestly, I'm expectign these "chemicals" to simply be explosives, lots of them. And once you're out of reach of Harbor Patrol's rescue craft ... *BOOM* goes the "Cargo", and your boat goes down (well, it goes EVERYWHERE, but you get the idea) ... with zero survivors.

Many criminal syndicates operate "banks" that will gladly hold said money in escrow - the runners don't get screwed by a J who jus won't pay, but the J doesn't get screwed by runenrs who just walk away with the money (and maybe the goods, in cases like this).

Not revenge, at least for the last job: The job was to fix up their crappy security system that had them as targets for any criminal looking to make a quick buck. The guy seems to be who he says he is, or else has some hold on our old boss... actually, I should probably check that angle out. can't be too careful, right?

Just walk away if you think something is off-kilter. If your group has never bailed on a run before this would be a very good time to start. If any of what you are suspecting is accurate getting paid is the least of your issues. Money is useless to dead people. Money held in an account by someone who is being hunted by Ares and SK for bioterrorism might as well not exist, you can't touch it. And you'll be dead as soon as the ritual is completed anyhow.

Short idea, and I don't know quite how viable it is... Open the cargo en route. Once you know what it is, stall the boat in the ocean and demand an explanation, or more money.

Make sure you have a rigger to deliver you an escape boat in advance, in case you have to scuttle or walk from the job.

I'd also be wary of the point you mentioned where you have to return with the boat. That sounds like an ideal place for an ambush to happen. Just have a sniper or two ready on the return route.
Check to see what routes are available to *Destination*. If there's only one, that adds another level of danger.

Go with Johnson to bank and witness the placing of money in a safe deposit box. Make sure the key has a secure RFID tag integrated. Johnson sends key to cargo origination contact who places it aboard the ship. Key is specially manufactured to also double as the key to the ship's secure ignition system (motor fuses if removal of system is attempted) which only operates with the specialized key inserted. At boarding, runners RFID scan the key to confirm its genuineness and proceed with delivery. I suppose there's nothing stopping runners from getting on a chopper as soon as they have the key and ditching the cargo though so you might have to come up with another proviso to set johnson at ease. Ideas on that point welcome. This arrangement would put the money in the hands of a much more neutral 3rd party--one who johnson would have a hard time justifying defrauding or intimidating given bank's reputation and relationship with client.

If the employer heard about you for fixing a security system, it's not oo surprising he's hiring you in a security role. The pay and th return clause seems both fishy - though if he warmed about serious possible troubles on the way the pays might be explainable.

One of the first thing I'd do would be to comb the boat from keel to topmast with a fine brush - bot hto know it's layout in case you have to fight onboard and to make sure there's nothing untoward with it (say explosives in the ballast tanks or double hull. Ballast tanks on a cargo doesn't turn into a submarine, but they let you pump water to fine-tune the ship's balance if the cargo isn't balanced on it's own)

In cas of a double cross, there's no sure way to get paid beyond the advance - collecting the money tends to put you at a definite time in a definite location, where you can get targeted - including framing you for somehting nasty and letting the Law do the removal fror you)

1) Do not open the box
2) The cat is dead, don't open the box
3) the cat is also alive, don't open the box.

The cat is in a superposition where it's both alive and dead and frankly you don't need to know. Because if the cat is dead. So are you.

In short:
You don't. Walk away from the job. It's hugely overpaid, so the up-front half will suit you just fine. Call it "compensation for trying to get me killed" or whatever.

Schrodinger's Shadowrun?

Quantumrun

Any relation to Quantum Leap?

For basic paranoia, get the money set into an Escrow account. Yes, you may lose a few percent but then it's a guarantee payout. The corp may decide they can write off the expense and add a few nuyen for bullets in the brainpan, but the cash will be there when and if you survive the double-cross.

If you are certain about the double cross, and can't walk away, then set up the environment to be to your best advantage. Control the area, have diversions in place etc. A drone shooting blanks to make them focus on a different area, or laying down supressive fire if you don't mind sending lead down range. A holoprojector with a decent video loop--it requires a Perception (2) test to notice its a hologram. Stack on some visibility modifiers (Glare, smoke etc) and it will hold up for a few seconds. And those are just the tech side...illusions, extra manpower, etc can all help.

Off topic note: who decided that a quantum leap should mean "a big step"? Quantum mechanics happens on a tiny tiny tiny scale, so it ought to mean a miniscule step.

It's impossible to effectively search a ship like this for a fairly small (but sufficient) charge or tracking device without someone with a lot of experience on large ships, inspection tools, and a week tied up somewhere where your team can take apart and reassemble the ship for 16 hours a day. There are hundreds of places you could hide stuff. Like inside the main reduction gearing case. Not to mention you can simply attach something to the hull from the outside. Which I'm told is a lot harder to detect than you might think.

What? Where? Who said that?

Scott Bakula

What I had in mind was more in the 'blows the ship appart and kills eveyone onboard' sort of surprise - you won't find the shipboard equicalent of a brain bomb, but it should detect heavt tampering. One of the things i'd check very closely would be the lifeboats. And even if there's nothing suspcious found, make sure to have my own - something like zodiac with enough of an outboard motor to go ashore from any point int the planned route - wiith a 2 or 300% seafty margin, just in case. having a GPS might be a cheap and effective way to check that the ship's navigation system is doing what it's supposed to.

But globally, I'd probably ask the Johnson several question (including 'why the heck are you paying theat much for what sounds like a cakewalk') and simply tell him to keep his job if I don't like the answers.

"If you have the resources necessary to pay what you claim you will be paying, then you also have the resources necessary to avoid paying what you claim you will be paying. I think we should part strangers." -Your Team's Face

SND--By that logic, wouldn't that mean that you should walk away from every job? I don't have an issue with walking from a double-cross, but the logic seems off.

Edited: "If you have the resources necessary to pay what you claim you will be paying, then you also have the resources necessary to have a thorough dossier of this team and know payment will be recieved or extracted by any means necessary. This is your only chance to part strangers." -Your Team's Face (using intimidate)

Reality check here, OP.

The Johnson is offering 50K each. I'm presuming you have a team of at least 4 people, probably 5 or 6.

That means that their total budget for hiring your team for "security" - a legitimate purpose - is 200,000-300,000


For two hundred grand, you could hire an Ares Firewatch team (or a similar team from another corp if Ares is unsuitable) to ride along on that boat - and to bring escort vessels and choppers.

If your paranoia meter isn't screaming at you to take the money and run without looking back, that's because it's suffering a stack overflow.


In short, this is the motherfucker of all set-ups. You should do as the song says and take the money and run. Relocate from Seattle to some other sprawl, and change your faces. That, or just decline the job and run.


Even if it's straight-up legit, with no intentions whatsoever of a double-cross, this run is going to be too hot to handle. You do not want any part of something so valuable and so hot that they could afford to budget a Firewatch team for security but for some reason require a deniable asset.

Maybe the Johnson does not want Ares sticking their noses into what is going on. *shrug* Besides, "Too Hot" is relative...
That said, I would prepare for a double cross, no doubt.

TJ, I used Ares Firewatch as an example. If you belong to a corp that has something worth shipping that's so heavy-duty that your security budget is around a quarter of a million nuyen, you either have in-house security you can contract, have an allied megacorp whose elite security team you can contract, or you can hire frigging MET2000 - a professional mercenary company - or one of the other professional security companies, such as Lone Star, to secure it.


So promising a quarter of a million to a bunch of runners? That does scream "set-up." If I were you, I'd demand that the rest of the money be placed with an escrow service.

Another idea:
Maybe the employer doesn't want to exactly screw you over, but rather expects very serious trouble? Of course, his party will deny all knowledge about hefty pirates entering your ship, but thank you for setting up defense... and our generous payment should already cover for that, right?
First thing: Make sure you get half of the money up front and try to set up some third party to secure the rest until completion or failure.

Another thing: Make sure to inspect the crate! Set up hazard suits or drones and an airtight seal so nothing could ever break out. Maintain said seal just in case they will open something remotely.
Maybe you're set up as scapegoats? "Oh, see, those runners are smuggling plutonium! Officer, somebody should check on their boat..." You'd end up getting caught or fighting law personnel. Bad situation either way.
Take preparations to just sink the damn crate in the ocean, just in case. A lot of nasty stuff has gone this way anyhow. Most biological and chemical weapons don't do that much a rough mile below sea level. Some do, so seal the crate before sinking it.

You could still steal the ship and sell it to some pirates Does somebody in your team know how to maneuver such a thing? Otherwise you're in their hands...

For your satellite uplink: Organise a spare one in case the main one gets cut off. It's the first thing I'd do.

You might want to consider using your shitload of money to hire a smuggler with a submarine to snuggle up against and cling to the boat you're running security on. If deep shit goes down, you jump ship, clambor aboard the sub and run away.

So I told them "I'll be shadowing you. If things go bad just jump over the side and I'll surface and pick you up." And they believed me. Too bad I didn't really have a sub, but the money was pretty good, and they never came back to complain.

It's a real shame they left word of the deal with someone NOT going on the boat, with instructions to "spread the word" if you showed back up, but they didn't.

Which means now your rep's in the crapper, and that may be the LAST money you see from runners for a good long while ...

Eeeeeyup.

That's also why you actually make sure to hire someone who actually does have a sub, like Sounder or someone.

Arrange for your own ride home, sea travel is rife with piracy in the 6th World.

I work in shipping and the rates for security details vary widely. Then again there are a lot of not so professional people trying to earn some money in this business.

To ensure payment you ask for a downpayment and have them put the rest of the mneys in escrow with your fixer (i.e. a trusted third-party). This way there is no incentive to screw you over from the Johnsons-side. You can also have the fixer guarantee a default by the Johnson.

Get a troll. Have him shake the Mr. Johnson until pay comes out of him.

If that doesn't work, well... Parts is parts when it comes to the street clinics.

"Dead is dead, parts is parts .... and dead people is parts!"

Cheater!

Trying to get help on a forum.

I boo ya!

Get a slightly bigger box, say 6 inches thick walls of solid steel. Make sure one side is open. Put the suspicious box in this box and attach a cargo net on the open side. Point open side in a direction where any blast wont hurt the boat or anyone on the boat. You have the hazmat covered already.

Basic premise is to use bomb disposal methods for a 'safe detonation'.

I sense the GM just found you out Fueldrop.

Since I showed him the thread, if he hadn't found me out then I'd be very confused.

A likely excuse... I'm on to your wily schemes.