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Troyminator
Hi All;

First, some background:

<background:on>

I tried once a few years ago to run a Shadowrun game. For various reasons, it imploded. Between a busy life and general gaming burnout, I haven't role-played in about a year and my old group seems to have dissolved. I have found a group of about 3-4 friends who seem interested in playing (one of whom will have to drive about 2 hours to get to my place to play). I am not exceptionally confident as a GM.

<background:off>

I created it in a 2.5 day meeting I am at and I don't have access to my core rule book. Any details have been gotten off the interwebs. As my players and I are new to the rules, I am estimating that it will take several hours to go through this run. I would love it if you smarter and more experienced people could take a look at the VERY basic run I have designed and offer tweaks for rules that I may not have referenced correctly and ideas to make it flow better/more interesting. I'm not too fond of the extended tests trying to track down Celeste. If there is a better/more interesting way to do it, please suggest something. Here we go.


The players are contacted by their fixer(s) to meet a Mr. Johnson (Vincent Armand). Mr. Johnson's daughter (Celeste) has gone missing and he is hiring the runners to find them. He is going through the runners rather than the cops because she, most likely, disappeared in one of the Barrens and he (unbeknownst to the runners) is part of the Mafia.

He offers each runner <amount to be determined via the formula in the 5th edition handbook after the opposition has been fleshed out>. He also offers what information he has and gives the runners a picture of his daughter.

Legwork (are the number of hits needed generated by extended tests or "one shot" rolls (I could look it up, but I don't have my book with me)

Vincent Armand
Contacts Data-Search
0 0 Wasn't he an actor in the late 1900's, early 2000's?
1 3 Sounds familiar, I think he's in organized crime
2 6 He's part of the mafia
4+ 10+ He is a picciotto for the Finnegan Family. He works in the financial area.

Celeste Armand
0 0 She's a nova-hot dwarf porn starlet. Likes to work with trolls
1 3 I think she's a dilettante. Likes to party
2 5 She's the daughter of Vincent Armand. Like to relieve her boredom and take it out on daddy by playing in the barrens.
4+ 10+ She likes to hang out either at Loveland Quin's in the Puyallup Barrens or Banshee in Touristville

A glitch in Celeste's legwork will send the runners to Carbonado. A critical glitch will send them to Glow City.

If the runners go to Loveland Quinn's and show the picture, the regulars recognize her and note that she hasn't been in for a week or so.
At Banshee, the say she was there a couple of days ago and left with a crew of the "Crimson Crush" and the group went East.

A Negotiation (diplomacy- 5, 30 minutes) or Electronics (hacking- 5, 30 minutes) shows that the "Crush" was ambushed by a group of Yakuza about a mile away from Banshee, the Yakuza took Celeste, and headed South.

A Negotiation (diplomacy- 5, 30 minutes) or Electronics (hacking- 5, 30 minutes) shows that the Yakuza were ambushed by a group of ghouls. The survivors (including Celeste) and deceased were taken East.

A Negotiation (diplomacy- 5, 30 minutes), Perception (5, 30 minutes), or Electronics (hacking- 5, 30 minutes) shows the warehouse into which the ghouls went (Since ghouls astrally perceive, can they be sneaked-up on?).

Inside the warehouse, there is an area where the corpses are being stored/eaten and an area where the living (5 yaks and Celeste) are being kept to soon become din-din. During the ensuing chaos if there is a glitch on a firearm or magic attack, it will hit one of the Yakuza. If there is a critical glitch, it will hit Celeste.

I plan on the 4 runners (5 if they want me to run an NPC) to go up against 6 normal ghouls and a ghoul adept. Is this too much, too little, or juuuuuuuuust right?

On the way back, they will be accosted by a group of Yakuza looking for their members and trying to take back Celeste (she is part of a plan the Yakuza have to annoy/irritate/ the Mafia in general and maybe get some leverage on Vincent Armand). Depending on how beat up the runners are, the Yaks may fight them for Celeste or not. A social check could be used to get out (relatively) unscathed.

At the drop-off/final meet, things will go without incident (unless the runners start trouble). If Celeste is killed, Vincent will blame the Yakuza rather than the runners.

Thank you in advance for all your help!

Troy
DrZaius
I would consider adding some red herrings so the adventure feels less on the rails. Does Celeste have a boyfriend? Does she have a job? Wasn't she seen with two orks one of your runners know who work with the vory? Etc. Have her car be abandoned somewhere, possibly stolen, and leave some clues inside.
Lobo0705
All of the things I'm writing down are with love - always willing to help someone out. Please feel free to ignore whatever you don't like smile.gif

QUOTE (Troyminator @ Apr 5 2014, 08:14 PM) *
The players are contacted by their fixer(s) to meet a Mr. Johnson (Vincent Armand). Mr. Johnson's daughter (Celeste) has gone missing and he is hiring the runners to find them. He is going through the runners rather than the cops because she, most likely, disappeared in one of the Barrens and he (unbeknownst to the runners) is part of the Mafia.


Why isn't he using his own guys? Is that a concern?

QUOTE (Troyminator @ Apr 5 2014, 08:14 PM) *
A Negotiation (diplomacy- 5, 30 minutes) or Electronics (hacking- 5, 30 minutes) shows that the "Crush" was ambushed by a group of Yakuza about a mile away from Banshee, the Yakuza took Celeste, and headed South.

A Negotiation (diplomacy- 5, 30 minutes) or Electronics (hacking- 5, 30 minutes) shows that the Yakuza were ambushed by a group of ghouls. The survivors (including Celeste) and deceased were taken East.

A Negotiation (diplomacy- 5, 30 minutes), Perception (5, 30 minutes), or Electronics (hacking- 5, 30 minutes) shows the warehouse into which the ghouls went (Since ghouls astrally perceive, can they be sneaked-up on?).


Who are they negotiating with to find out the Crush were ambushed? Why do the Yaks want her - are we assuming they know who she is? For that matter, why did she leave with the Crush?
Who are they negotiating with to find out that the Yaks were ambushed? (Lots of ambushing going on here wink.gif)
As above, who are they negotiating with to find out where the Ghouls went? It is hard to sneak up on dual natured beings, but remember they can't see through walls.

QUOTE (Troyminator @ Apr 5 2014, 08:14 PM) *
I plan on the 4 runners (5 if they want me to run an NPC) to go up against 6 normal ghouls and a ghoul adept. Is this too much, too little, or juuuuuuuuust right?


That is going to depend on the characters. Sounds about right for the sample characters out of the book.

QUOTE (Troyminator @ Apr 5 2014, 08:14 PM) *
On the way back, they will be accosted by a group of Yakuza looking for their members and trying to take back Celeste (she is part of a plan the Yakuza have to annoy/irritate/ the Mafia in general and maybe get some leverage on Vincent Armand). Depending on how beat up the runners are, the Yaks may fight them for Celeste or not. A social check could be used to get out (relatively) unscathed.


Not sure if you want to add another fight right after the big fight to save Celeste, you may want to consider just letting them bring her home.


QUOTE (Troyminator @ Apr 5 2014, 08:14 PM) *
At the drop-off/final meet, things will go without incident (unless the runners start trouble). If Celeste is killed, Vincent will blame the Yakuza rather than the runners.


That is very reasonable of him - considering he didn't know the Yaks were involved! wink.gif
Troyminator
Thanks for the replies and help. Here's some responses to the responses. wink.gif

"Why isn't he using his own guys? Is that a concern?"
His daughters antics have embarrassed his superiors and he wants this recovery to be as hush hush as possible.

"Who are they negotiating with to find out the Crush were ambushed?"
Somehow I had a copy of "Sprawl Wilds" on my computer. In the "Humanitarian Aid" portion of it, it had the runners making negotiation tests against the locals to find clues about where to go next, so I went with it. That is why there are so many negotiation tests: they are talking to the locals to see if they know what happened. If there is a better way to do this, please let me know.

"Why do the Yaks want her - are we assuming they know who she is? For that matter, why did she leave with the Crush?"
The Yaks want her as a pressure point against Armand, they do know who she is and her partying proclivities, and she left with the Crush to go to a party and have some more fun.

"Who are they negotiating with to find out that the Yaks were ambushed? (Lots of ambushing going on here wink.gif)"
see above

"As above, who are they negotiating with to find out where the Ghouls went?"
see above

"It is hard to sneak up on dual natured beings, but remember they can't see through walls."
Correct me if I'm wrong (I most likely am), but I thought Astral Perceiving could "see" through walls.

"That is very reasonable of him - considering he didn't know the Yaks were involved! wink.gif"
I figured that Vincent would initially be pissed at them, but once he learned that the Yaks were involved, would become more concerned about that. I'm trying to use this as a lead-in to the next run where Vincent hires them to steal something from a local Yak facility.

Thanks for all your help. I really appreciate it. Someday I will learn how to use the "quote" feature. It never seems to work for me/I don't know how to use it correctly.
Mantis
QUOTE (Troyminator @ May 10 2014, 07:56 AM) *
"Who are they negotiating with to find out the Crush were ambushed?"
Somehow I had a copy of "Sprawl Wilds" on my computer. In the "Humanitarian Aid" portion of it, it had the runners making negotiation tests against the locals to find clues about where to go next, so I went with it. That is why there are so many negotiation tests: they are talking to the locals to see if they know what happened. If there is a better way to do this, please let me know.


The usual way is for the players to ask their contacts for this sort of info. If the contacts know nothing, or the players fail to get enough hits with an etiquette test then you can move to something like this. I think Humanitarian Aid does it the way it does because the characters are not in a place where their contacts have influence. If this works for you, fly with it but keep in mind it sidelines those contacts the players have paid for/earned/etc.

QUOTE (Troyminator @ May 10 2014, 07:56 AM) *
"It is hard to sneak up on dual natured beings, but remember they can't see through walls."
Correct me if I'm wrong (I most likely am), but I thought Astral Perceiving could "see" through walls.

Walls are opaque to astral sight, so no, you can not see through them. Astral forms can pass through them easily but they act as a barrier to sight in the same way they do in the real world. Glass also acts this way on the Astral so keep that in mind as well.
kzt
The payouts in SR5 are typically absurdly low and have crazy parameters like how many people get killed. You should ignore them.

It's not like this guy can hire someone else to go get his kid if the players fail, so how much is his kid worth to him? How rich is he? Is he paying a reasonable amount given that he is essentially asking them to go into a very dangerous place and shoot people in the face for him and then STFU about it? If he can't offer enough, can he do something else for them, either now or later? Remember that the fixer is either getting paid or is doing this as a favor too, so all the money isn't going to the players.

So how did a group of ghouls ambush a bunch of heavily armed professional gunmen in a convoy of vehicles? I think you have at least one too many ambushes here.
Shemhazai
If the ghouls are a breeze, maybe the Yaks should bust in to rescue their people, mistaking the team for the kidnappers. If the ghouls are about to win, the Yaks come and assist.

If the team ends up killing the girl, maybe one of the Yaks got it on cybereye video and will hold it against the team, blackmailing them for a favor.

Depending on how things work out, there's a good chance to pick up some contacts.
Troyminator
You all are awesome! Thanks muchly
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