I've been running another Shadowrun campaign for some time now - we started in December '16, playing 3rd edition once a week, for a few hours.. the curse of growing up and having families - it's been getting harder to get free time at mutually convenient points.

Still, we're making progress, and the team are coming along nicely.

The characters were all built using the BP system from the Companion. They each had 135 BP to give a slightly more advanced start, but were told not to take any gear or goodies as at the start of the campaign they would begin play "captured" and wouldn't get to keep them - and stood a very good chance of not being able to get them back. On the other hand, this meant there were more BP for skills, stats and internal ware.

They manged to escape captivity, and steal a truck, and since then have been grubbing their way up the ladder, doing jobs where they could find them, upgrading their gear and chipping away at random bandits along the way.

At the end of each week's session, I do a narrative writeup of the events, as part of my notekeeping. There are occasional embellishments on events or changes in emphasis to help the story flow, but on the whole it's a pretty accurate representation of what happened to the players. I normally post these weekly to my FB account (Kren Cooper - there aren't that many Krens on FB, and my profile is open if you want to look). I've not posted them here up to now, as I wasn't sure if people would want to read them - but I have a bunch of people that wait for their weekly episode now on FB, so I figured - why not.

So - here is a link to a PDF that contains the writeup to episodes 001- 134: via dropbox
The document was getting quite unwieldy and causing MS Word to choke - which surprised me as the file is still less than 2MB in size.
So, instead I've broken this down into "books" by grouping a bunch of chapters together that seem to fit in an arc, and trying to keep them as a more manageable size:
Book 1, Chapters 001 - 050, 172K words, 252 pages
Book 2, Chapters 050 - 078, 182K words, 270 pages
Book 3, Chapters 079 - 102, 194K words, 294 pages
Book 4, Chapters 103 - 127, 191K words, 296 pages
Book 5, Chapters 128 - 154, 251K words, 385 pages
Book 6, Chapters 155 - 183, 265K words, 410 pages
Book 7, Chapters 184 - 209, 236K words, 364 pages
Book 8, Chapters 210 - 242, 259k words, 400 pages
Book 9, Chapters 243 - 277, 305k words, 479 pages
Book 10, Chapters 278 -xxx, 223K words, 352 pages

It is quite a long read, and obviously rising on a weekly basis. If anyone does read through it, I particularly welcome comments and criticisms. And if anyone wants to appear as an NPC - just drop in a bio or NPC description as a response, and I'll fit you in somewhere.

In addition, the story can also be found at two fic sites which might be easier for mobile reading or to download all in one go:
The story at FanFiction: https://www.fanfiction.net/s/13718688/1/Smu...Shadowrun-Story
The story at Achrive Of Our Own: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26978617?..._full_work=true

The characters (and links to the PDF character sheets as of 06/10/2017) are:
Kai (face) the team leader - a Mongolian Elven physical adept specialising in social skills working as an art smuggler
Aswon (samurai-sharpshooter) - a human Nigerian physical adept, with a talent for sharpshooting
Shimazu (samurai-bodyguard) - a human Japanese physical adept specialising in melee combat and security related skills
Tadibya (shaman) - a human Nenet tribeswoman from near the arctic circle, on a "walkabout"
Marius (rigger) - a human German pilot, particularly skilled in rotorcraft management
Hunter (samurai-smuggler) - an ork smuggler / scout, with an extensive set of body modifications

Character sheets have been updated after the karma awards at the end of session 90 - here are the updated PDFs, so you can compare them with the originals above
Kai 01/05/19
Aswon 01/05/19
Shimazu 01/05/19
Tads 01/05/19
Marius 01/05/19
Hunter 01/05/19

And after another karma award and a good amount of training time around session 131, the character sheets got updated again.
Aswon 18/05/2020
Hunter 18/05/2020
Kai 18/05/2020
Marius 18/05/2020
Shimazu 18/05/2020
Tads 18/05/2020

Characters were updated again at the end of session 183, but haven't changed that much, so I haven't relinked them. If you are curious about the sheets though, do let me know, and I can put them up.
Hope you enjoy!

Thanks, I look forward to a good long read. We play 3rd too, although rather less often - we also have issues with RL getting in the way of our group's highly deserved murder and mayhem at the tabletop

I did something similar for a campaign that ran three years, although my weekly summaries were more succinct. I applaud the effort.

One of my favorite characters was from a low-powered campaign that began the same way. ("Don't buy anything because you're starting off naked and afraid.") I appreciated how I could round out the character with points I would have otherwise spent on gear.

I might chip away at this. What are you looking for in terms of comments or criticisms? Plot? The write-up itself? Obviously you're not entirely responsible for the action.

I don't suppose the character sheets are posted online, are they? What are the group dynamics like OOCly?

I have created PDF files of the character sheets and put them on Dropbox, and added links to the initial post.

In terms of feedback - anything really!
It would be good to hear if people enjoy the story (or if they don't, but can offer constructive criticism - that's helpful too)
If people have comments on the plot, the NPCs, the descriptions or locations, suggestions on consequences for things they think are dumb, if you found a plot mechanic or twist interesting, or have a suggestion for an NPC, corporation or piece of tech - I'm all ears.

As to our "Group Dynamic":
Aswon is played by Jez, a civil servant, coming up on 40, and our original GM - been playing Shadowrun for 20+ years. Really into the SR lore, has read all the novels and we constantly exchange messages about house rules, new drones, new metamagics etc
Marius is played by Lee, a production clerk, just over 40, been playing for 20+ years from SR1-2 at Uni, and met Jez when a student. Also very much a "lore monkey"
Kai is played by Fozzy, a graphics designer, around 40, been playing for 10 years, but plays just for the social part of the game - not really into the background so much.
Hunter is played by Justin, a clinical worker, around 45, been playing for 10 years, but is more of an action / combat than deep RP player, and also not so much into the lore.
Shimazu is played by Tom, Justins son, and a student. He's only been playing about a year, but seems to enjoy the RP side more than his dad.
Tads is played by Ali, another civil servant, also coming up on 40. She enjoys playing support characters and not being in the limelight, and has also played for about 10 years. She loves the RP side, but isn't into the mechanics (which is why her character sheet tells her how many successes she needs to soak...)

Jez is very proactive, and normally ends up being saddled as the "leader". Fozzy normally plays the wild and unpredictable "Murdock" style characters - so making him the team leader is a nice stretch for him. Lee likes to have a long term goal to work towards - at the moment he wants to get rid of the truck and get a nice cargo helicopter to do proper smuggling in. Justin wants lots of action sequences and to "win" situations. Tom is pretty quiet, and I think is still finding his feet with RP (and it's very funny to see him telling his dad's character he's being a dick - really messes with the normal social dynamics) and Ali likes to stick to her moral compass and play a white hat, or at most a murky grey.

And me? I'm about 45 ish, an IT infrastructure engineer, have been playing about 10 years. I met Jez through live roleplay, we ended up living near each other, and he introduced us to SR3 and we started a Seattle based campaign which ran for 6+ years in the end, playing weekly. We had a break from SR and moved to Pathfinder for a few years, and have just come back to SR again after I started running Pink Mohawk drop in games and getting Jez all keen again. I love my RP, and like to have stories relating to character background and lots of personal development, as well as some cool toys and some nice action sequences. I also like to make sure that everyone in the team gets a "hero" moment every now and again, to give them a lasting memory. And sometimes, the brain weasels attack, and I seek outside validation for what I'm doing....

You can lead a horse to water – but you can’t make it drink, or so the saying goes.

The events described below took place in the writeup from 24/12/2059 to 30/12/2059.
The team were given the job to observe another team gaining entry to a temple, and spy on them, gathering lots of intel for their boss, back in Tashkent.
The enemy team were statted quite highly – they were to represent a “prime” runner team, with lots of gear and resources, and the players soon realised this, and that a frontal assault was likely to end in them all getting killed, and that they needed to be very careful.
The temple team (the diggers from here on) had the following details:
Equipment
• Truck – Ares Grand Canyon (P169 R3, see Conestoga Trailblazer, imp off road handling 6): 12m trailer, heavy cab, 4 points vehicle armour, off road tyres, rigged, otherwise basic
• 2 X Ares R (P173 R3) series with twin heavy mechanical arms (Str and cargo bins – for excavating, low encryption network
• 2 X Ares Arbiters (P173 R3 – see Doberman) – patrol drone, rigger adaption and fully comp LMG with pilot shooting 5 dice autonomous, low encryption network
• 2 X Ares EIS-200 (P173 R3 – see Condor, but with sensors 3) – long endurance surveillance drones, low encryption network
• 4 X tripod mount sentry guns – Ares Firestorm, in foam rocks which will be painted up, mounting fully comp HMGs with fibre cables back to master control unit (sensor 5, autoshot 5), one turn for catalyst to melt away cover – highly encrypted rigger network
• 1 X Ares Sergeant-II (P177 R3 – see Dalmation, extra load) – VTOL UAV armed with Panther cannon with AV – highly encrypted rigger network
• 1 X Ares Dune Master (p165 R3 – see light strike) – highly encrypted rigger network
And the diggers had the following timeline sketched out for them:
Timeline
1. 25th Set out drones+camo
2. 26th Start to excavate
3. 27th more excavation, roof secured
4. 28th explore and document, recover some artefacts – 1 X refined mercury in vial, 2X refined silver bar, 1 X copper ingot
5. 29th explore and find stairs down a level, generator at night
6. 30th Drop to sub level and make safe, set up 3rd sentry gun facing temple entrance, Blaster acid trap
7. 31st More excavation. Wee-woo m+ Spangles perform magic ritual
8. 1st – Excavate behind negated magical barrier
9. 2nd – more excavating and shoring up
10. 3rd – more excavating, find alternate way down to bottom level
11. 4th – reach bottom level
12. 5th – another magic ritual to find passphrase for magical barrier
13. 6th – release the horror
I’d got a table for random encounters whilst they were set up:
D6, per 12 hours: 1-2 = encounter, 3-6 none, then roll 1 D6 again:
1 = minor earthquake
2 = wandering shepherds
3 = mana storm
4 = drone patrol
5 = corp patrol
6 = critter attack
The team were originally briefed that is was the Atlantean Foundation doing a dig for historical artefacts. In fact, it is not AF / DIMR, instead it is a team of 10 runners, searching for ancient power stones. The stones are buried deep in the temple, behind strong wards and traps.
Team consists of
1. Rocket, human, male, 29, face / sam, average face, good leadership, loves rocket launchers, skillwires+drivers, low reaction buff, blond, desert tan shirt and trousers, digger hat
2. Spangles, dwarf, female, 33, concealment and defensive wizard, hermetic, g4, sorcery only, selection of R6-8 spells, some extended, mostly non-lethal, hippy tie dye outfits - hermetic
a. Ex-area, Trid phantasm 6, Cure disease 6, Heal 8, Chaff 6,
extended quickening for the trid phantasm, improved masking on the spell, spell specific power focus – trid phantasm – it’s ALL about the hiding
3. Mamma-bear, ork, female, 23, rigger, drives the heavy transport fitted with off-road tyres, r2 rigger, general skills, mid quality deck and systems, work overalls, blue denim
4. Spotlight, troll, male, rigger, drone specialist, good at surveillance and also doubles as HtH combat, has a bunch of aerial and ground support drones with up to LMG armed with ex-ex/HP, and one with AV for heavy use.
5. Digger, dwarf, male, 50s, mining and construction expert – was semi-retired, called in for expert support, skills slipping and mostly here for knowledge, jeans, suede jacket
6. Wee-woo, human aboriginal shaman, 18,female, conjurer, not initiated, headstrong and can be a little foolish, spirits to F7
7. Topshot, elf, female, 45, sniper specialist, good concealment, has a macmillian 50 cal with apds and smartlink, good wires and all vision mods, ex-forces (france) now running as a merc – digimax cammo fatigues, ghillie suit, ruthenium R4, massaging liner
8. Blaster, ork, male, 16, heavy set ork, with deluxe gyromount and hmg with max recoil comp and +2 from strength, heavy padded jumpsuit in
9. Slapdash, human, 23, phys-add, g3 initiate, lots of great leap and fall, wall running and improved skill martial art – very high quickness and lightning fast movement, but not reactions
10. Geo, human, 25, female, decker, info support and comms specialist, also fixer, jeans and fleece, baseball cap –combat biker team
The team are digging down into the ruins and will take 13 days to discover the treasure. They have tents set up outside and a strong perimeter defence.

As Hunter was the only person with eyes on, and was monitoring them via a laser microphone, he would be in a position to pick up bits of chatter and information. Some of it would be germane – progress on the dig for the day, what they found, what they suspected. Some of it would be background information – the names of the digger team, what they did, what their skills were, how they would react in an attack. And some would be background fluff – lovelife, musical tastes, stories of the past, jokes etc.

So, what I did was make up half a dozen different “snippets” about each of them, and then separated them out into lines, printed them and cut them up. Every period of observation, I got Hunters player to make a perception check, adding in his complementary skills like surveillance and depending on how many successes he got, he would get more or less snippets of information.
Before the session, I took the player aside, and told him what the plan would be – that I would feed him these snippets, and it was up to him to expand upon them and put them in the context of the story he reported back to the rest of the team. He could free-roam with his story, and I would try to make their background fit – essentially, this was his chance to RP his little heart out, and weave a convincing tapestry for the other players. And the better he did this, the more Karma he would get for the RP.

*sigh*

What actually happened was that he made the tests, got the snippets, read through them. Giggled or sniggered at a few of them. Looked confused at some. But, then instead of describing what he had seen to the rest of the team, just handed the snippets out and passed them around the table for the other players to read.
What I was hoping for as a way to really let him RP and develop his character and approach, and betray some of his character traits by how he told the story of the digger team, instead became a non-event. And instead of getting a big juicy Karma award, Hunter came away with one of the lowest rewards from the mission.

Here are the tidbits, in case anyone is curious:
Rocket - likes a good drink, but has a thing for sourmash. Has a cyber-eye with laser designator. Loves dogs, can't stand cats. Has worked in France, did some kind of art theft. Is ticklish. Once fired a rocket straight up in the air, then ran over to the bad guys, surrendered to them, gave them the empty launcher and told them he was going to get them the bag of jewels, then took cover for when the rocket came down homing on the launcher.
Spangles - shys away from confrontation. Loves practical jokes. Partially colourblind. Believes in free love. Once blew a job because she was getting jiggy with a guard and couldn't concentrate on the trid phantasm and huge cocks appeared everywhere. Was saved from drowning by Rocket some time way back. Once tried to have sex with an earth elemental. Has a forge on the truck, and is an amateur blacksmith. Responsible for magical defences for the team, and makes jewellery for them.
Mamma-bear - comes from Oz, and turned up with Wee-Woo. Used to drive road trains. Thinks petrol engines are rubbish. Thinks American trucks are over-rated, and would prefer a Volvo. Once picked a fight with 8 gangers over the tuning of an engine and stabbed 2 of them to death with a screwdriver. Loves hot-chocolate. Exceptionally fine motor control and a whizz with a soldering iron - and needle and thread. Nobody will play cards with her because she deals seconds from the bottom of the deck.
Spotlight - from Germany, but no trace of accent. Is afraid of the water. Names all of his drones and talks to them. Gluten intolerant, but had to eat some bread on the job in Rome and was violently ill all over the Johnson’s shoes when they handed over the info. Took out the other 6 gangers and covered Mamma's back. Thinks Tae-Kwon-Do is better than Karate.
Digger - was retired, but came back to help out Geo. Has worked globally, and speaks at least a dozen languages like a native. Does Dad jokes. Has been involved in a big gold mine heist at some point. Skilled medic, he specialises in toxicology - and once had to deal with someone with an overdose of chilli extract to the eye. Has stories about diamond dealing in Antwerp, and mining stories from all over the world. Missing the two smallest fingers on his left hand, following a machinery accident.
Wee-woo - recently joined team, but knows Mamma-bear from the past. Didn't have any cold weather clothes. Doesn't trust snow. Doesn't understand why you can't eat yellow snow. Expert survival / hunter skills, and a tracker. Can't understand why Spangles doesn't talk to spirits. Is starting to emulate Spangles, and is trying to learn more magic from her, but doesn't get the concept of practical jokes - once left a deadly scorpion in someone's bed because "it was funny like the itching powder, yes?"
Topshot - French, but born in Norway. Has served in the norwegian army. Doesn't like jerky. Once waited for 2 days in the ceiling void and then shot a guy in the nuts with a 50 cal and killed him with hydrostatic shock whilst he was having a crap. Should never be allowed to drive - ever - for any reason. Is absolutely awful at shoot-em-up games and gets owned repeatedly. Once killed 8 targets by shooting out a chain holding a heavy container being loaded onto a ship, from a moving powerboat in the harbour. Rumoured that she happily drinks her own piss - but no one has ever had the nerve to ask her to her face. Regarded as asocial, but completely reliable.
Blaster - south african orphan. Used to work in a gold mine as a slave. Surprisingly softly spoken and gentle, was attacked by a bunch of toughs in Oz for being a poofter. Has never deliberately killed a person, though has caused deaths by sawing vehicles in half with his HMG. Loves astronomy and quite knowledgeable about star positions.
Slapdash - Loves cats, hates dogs. Has a tattoo of a dildo on his left ass cheek. Once rode a tiger in Korea after a roof gave way and he fell into an enclosure. Loves spicy food and adds hot sauce to just about everything, but won't touch chilli. Loves to spar against Spotlight, because of his reach advantage. Thinks Karate is better than Tae-Kwon-Do.
Geo - loves urban brawl and combat racing. Spent her cut of the gold mine heist buying a partial share in a combat biker team. Refers to Blaster as her baby brother. Has a degree in electrical engineering from Boston University. Served 2 years as an EW officer in the CAS navy before a "misunderstanding" involving the admiral’s sloop and 4 male petty officers and a jar of industrial lubricant.

Added writeup #37 to the master story, and updated the link in the first post. Ran session #38 last night, so going to start writing up the story at lunchtime - but the team are starting to move in on the Dekita assets and planning some demolition.

Added session 38 to the master story and updated the PDF and link in the top post.

Well, I didn't expect that.
Players getting ready to start the strike against the oil pipelines and well. So threw in the "distraction" - a spirit using the search power came and battered through the ward, found one of the team, then went back to its summoner. Shortly afterwards, Spangles and Wee-woo turn up in astral form (the two mages from the temple recon job back in Tashkent), asking for help. Something was released from behind a ward, and half their team is trapped underground.

The players *should* have said no. They're in the middle of a job. But they didn't.... they said "sure, we're on the way". And after a mad nights driving with a spirit using its movement power on the truck to increase the speed, they made the 1600km drive in just over 10 hours. Now they've had the story, they know some kind of spirit, with immunity to normal weapons, has been let loose by their tampering and has captured half the team, down on the 2nd level - and started to plot a rescue mission.

Now just how nasty a horror can I throw at them?
One of the thoughts is to have the horror/wraith/shedim/other creature having been released has feasted on the fear / pain of the team members there to regain strength, and will then escape. We're in 2060, so it could even be the catalyst for Shedim sightings and the eventual possession of Ibn Eisa. Then there is that knowledge that they "let something out", and sometime later in the timeline they will see what events they acted as a catalyst for...

I can also potentially throw a bit of treasure in there for them - they've already seen some alchemical materials come out, so maybe a few grams of Orichalcum wouldn't go amiss. The tech types are already salivating over the HMGs loaded with AV.

Should there be kickback from going on a sidequest do you think, or reward? Or a little of both?
Oh, and session 39 writeup uploaded, and top post edited with link.

Session #40 added - hooray, they managed the rescue, and got everyone out alive (so far).

The sentry gun should keep the horror at bay, at least long enough for them to set Demo and blow the entrance, trapping it inside the mountain.

The team also found a magic item - a bronzed spear. I got a standard weapon focus, and thought that as this is a 4th world artifact, it might have a a unique little twist, and some backstory (which I need to work on and develop, and work into play in the future)
"Right hand room, there is a bronzed spear hidden (2 successes at 8 on perception) in the dirt and refuse in the back corner – this is a F1 R2 weapon focus, that will cost +5kp over normal to bond, but also gives the wielder the equivalent of Shielding 1, active when held."

The team didn't get chance to investigate the well room fully, so they didn't pull up the bucket and find the magical tome hidden in there:
"Well room, there is a book hidden in the bucket, with 3D6 random spells, all at D6+5 level." Poor Tads, never mind...

And, due to the frantic nature of the fight, they didn't get chance to hoover up the ancient artefacts from the lair:
"In the summoning room there is some old coinage, pottery and artefacts of a general nature, worth up to 100k to the AF/DIMR, that will take at least 5-10 minutes to collect and scavenge."

The players at the moment are heading round the corner to get the Heavy sentry gun to cover them:
Ares Firestorm Heavy Machine Guns (DPV = 1290, FCU = 2.5, Weight = 18
Tripod mounted (RC6), belt fed (200 round box), High power, Recoil Comp 2, Heavy Barrel, Weight decrease 7. Damage = 11S base, Recoil Compensation 3(9). 9 round full-auto burst adjusted damage = 22D
Cost = 6450, SI=3, Availability 19/21 days, Legality code 1-H

As a reward for Hunter, assuming they RP appropriately when they get clear of the temple, I think I'm going to have the leader hand over one of their custom Ares top of the line guns - an updated version of the Ares Alpha Combat Gun:
Ares Alpha Combat Gun GL v2
Conceal 2, Ammo 30©, Mode BF/FA, Damage 9M, Weight 6, Avail 8/48hours, Cost 2000, SI 4, Legal 1-G, RC 2,Gas venting 2, Smartlink-2, Underbarrel Mini-GL, Top mount range finder, Safe target system

After fighting against the creature from the black lagoon, Shimazu is also going to complete his "attunement" to his sword, so he'll get the benefit from that.

As they've pretty much saved the hoop of the other team, they're going to be pretty grateful, so as a general reward, I think that Rocket and his team will also hand over a "guest card" to a smuggler stop.
I'm thinking this will be something that looks like an old baseball trading card, something pretty rare, but the batting averages" are a set of co-ordinates and an ID code to enter a smuggler base up on the Russian boarder. The card will act as a letter of recommendation to the crew there, and let the team get an "in" to a permanent base and set of smugglers, fixers, dealers and suppliers to boost their career a little.

Now of course, I need to design a smuggler base, a pot of contacts and work out what their next set of jobs might be...

As ever, C&C welcome, as are suggestions for NPCs - got a favourite runner of yours that would make a nice contact? Feel free to post some details!

And another writeup added to the story - they managed to drive back the horror for long enough to rescue the prisoners, and escape from the temple, setting off a large quantity of explosives behind them to bring down the mountain and seal off the complex. After that, they had to do surgery to get out the horrid creature that was infesting the prisoners (think a cross between a Go'uld and a larvae from Star Trek II). They got a bunch of goodies from the other team as a thank you, and then went all the way back to their actual mission.
Much planning and then on with the job. Some of the team went to plant some explosives on an oil pipeline - climbing up an escarpment and then onto a desert plateau to reach the pipeline.

Two things got in their way - both critters. The first were "cannonball goats" - goat critters with the movement power and a high run modifier that can move at truly ridiculous speeds on the charge - they also come with a hardened armour skull to allow them to headbutt like you would not believe. Shimazu got hit by one, and the knockdown test saw him thrown 18m back across the desert - there was no laughing after that impact!

Then, as they were planting demo on the pipeline, their rythmic footsteps triggered an attack of poisonous nova-scorpions. They managed to beat them off, but in the process Aswon was stung and has a potentially fatal dose of venom coursing through his system. They're now tranqing, stunballing, and using some date rape drugs (which they got from a bad guy in episode 2) to bring his heart rate down to <200 and stop him from burning out.

Lets just say that now the security team from the enemy corporation is not the only thing they're worried about any more!

And episode 42 is now up (https://www.facebook.com/notes/kren-cooper/smuggler-session-042/10155630242618964/) and added to the master story.
I think Aswon will be getting a point or two of stress on his body, just as an after effect of the venom. Nothing that should gimp him long term, but just to make him take things a little steady for the next day or two - of course, that also coincides with the high-stress break in to the compound and setting off explosives.

But, he also has his magic spear.
At the moment, I have this specced as a F1 weapon foci, with Reach 2 (which is nice!). Sure, it's not high force, so not that strong in combat - but it does let him hurt spirits, and bypass immune to normal weapons / critter armour. It also keeps the cost reasonable for bonding.
However, as a very old relic, I thought it should have a tweak - so I'm thinking of it having an extra power, which duplicates the "shielding" power when held, as if it was a grade 1 mage. That is, the spear gives him an extra dice to resist incoming spells with, and the casters target number is one higher. I was thinking about raising the karma cost to bond this by +5 for the "special nature" of the enchantment. Does that seem reasonable to people?

Episode 43 now up (https://www.facebook.com/notes/kren-cooper/smuggler-game-session-043/10155679659273964/)
Aswon did get enough stress points that he ended up suffering attribute failure on his quickness - but fortunately that was quickly healed by the medic and the shaman. Lots of planning on this one, and it all went a bit wrong at the 11th hour when the spirit carrying the last explosive was spotted as it closed on the compound - forcing an early and unexpected "go" on the mission.

We've got one more session before we break for Christmas, so hopefully we can clear this one down, get some karma awarded and leave it in a good place for a break for a few weeks!

C&C still welcome, of course.

Episode 44 now up (https://www.facebook.com/notes/kren-cooper/smuggler-game-session-044/10155693351733964/)
Marius ended up getting some stress on his drone, even with the spirit helping to carry the cargo - but got incredibly lucky on his stress roll, and only got 2 points.

The team also don't really understand what went on - but "Hans" from Maersk arranged for an incursion into Espirit territory, with his attack force leading them back towards Dekita territory. When they were close, they stealthed up and used their mage to conceal their fleeing vehicle, just as they crested a ridge, leaving the Dekita chopper as the only thing visible, which was radiating all kinds of sensors and targeting systems - and then just let the Espirit troops add 2+2 and get 5.

Our game group is on a break now until after christmas is done, so no more updates until about 12th January. I'll let you decide if that's a good thing or a bad thing....

Episode 45 now up - the team have hit the big time, with a very lucky and well played stock market bid - managing to buy at the low, and sell at the high purely by chance. They made nearly 700k from the deal, so it will be interesting to see what they do.

In case anyone is curious, I have put my notes taken in game below, along with the timeline of events and my plans for them, so you can see what the game mechanics were behind the narrative:

Back in the defile, an hour or two before dawn
Marius wants to respray the truck, desert tan
Shimazu and Kai both get a success, Aswon fails and has to have his redone, takes until 8am
Hunter calls Julius to warn him the run went down and to watch the area.
Johanna calls Kai – asks them to stay put for a day, maybe two – then she’ll be out to debrief them and pay them. Kai agrees.
Discussion – stay here or relocate, Aswon checks water levels and food – about a week if they are conservative
Aswon – raises idea of going back to the TCL to go paracritter hunting near Baku.
Discussion about where to go, decide not to go anywhere as too much time lost in transit, or involves going to kum-dag which they were told not to do.
Aswon learn cooking 1, make cookies from ingredients made by Tads
Tads decides to “teach” Shimazu and Kai how to do wards, as the truck was getting low on duration
Day passes uneventfully
Aswon tries to attune to spear to determine bonding cost for the spear – gets wibbly feeling from it, nothing useful. Tads has a look, good roll – picks up on extra damage effect and lower karma cost to bond.
No one else does anything in particular, next day also uneventful.
Aswon practices with spear and gets used to it.
Morning of the 16th – J calls K, asks for cover from spell casting
Johana tumbles from vehicle, tads casts imp invis, 6 success F5, she walks in 15 mins, met by team
Kai bluffs that they had been watching the share price. J agrees to give them the top end 50k, then offers 25k or the travel papers
Team decide on travel papers, get encrypted with teams thumbprints to activate.
Aswon jokingly asks if they can get a lift to Baku – J says “sure”, after checking with M about weight of vehicle, next ship is in 4 days.
Head into Kum Dag – order parts for truck, do maintenance, Tads finishes meditation for initiation, Hunter checks the news for share prices etc
Tads initiation, wasnt' aiming for anything in particular, left it to her totem– D6 rolls, 1-2 Masking, 3-4 Invoking, 5-6 Warding specialist - rolls a 5
In Kum-Dag until the 21st , relaxing, get to 18th, prices down to 57 Ny per share
Team now discussing buying into shares – discussion about how to do it, via the charity?
On the 19th - 10:37, shares hit 17 nuyen. Team decide to buy in
Kai etiquette and negotiation to find online brokerage, use charity company, Marius doing the trading. Find broker that will take 3.5% commission on buys and sells, 5.5% on shorts and longs
Buying 1000 shares @19665 (inc fee)
Next day, load onto the oil ship, see price climbing
Put in order to broker – sell @ over 100, or under 85, will pay fee after. Etiquette check – gets two >10, adviser says they may want to rethink. During call it goes to 114, they agree to sell if it drops more 10%
Next morning, price up to 274 on checking. By lunch 342, by 21:00 691 – frantic sell orders!
691,000 nuyen, 24,185 fee, all good
Drop to 490 by the morning – random encounter rolled!
Assuming that, roll 2 X random encounters –
1. Nova Scorpion attacks when someone out of the truck
2. Wandering boy with goats – curious
3. Free desert spirit, only F1
4. Sandstorm
5. Manastorm
6. Eloping lovers – Karim and Tushoon from Kum Dag (one Espirit aligned, one Dekita)

Debrief / Pay
Operating costs for the truck = 15K per month
Agreed pay was 30-50K for the team. In light of performance, Johanna will agree to pay either 75K in credsticks, or 50K+ a set of Maersk documents that should allow the team to get away via a Maersk freighter / cargo carrier in the future.

News reports / timeline
Day 1 – 14th - Dekita Oil shares plummet from 528 down to 396 amidst news of continued production delays. Morning of the job
Day 2 - 15th – Dekita Oil trading suspended after they hit automated stops in the exchanges. Trading continues after lunch, but further reports from Kazastan shows a number of pipeline fires and broken wells force the price down from 396 to 297
Day 3 – 16th – Trading suspended again following further losses in share price
Day 4 – 17th - Contamination suspected in the Dekita processing plant in Baku, 200,000 barrels embargoed, price hits 3rd strike speed bump at 148.5. Johanna pays team. Team to KD
Day 5 – 18th - Trading sees shares slump to 57 Nuyen each
Day 6 – 19th - Shares hit what appears to be a low of 17 Nuyen, and start to recover
Day 7 – 20th - News of the contamination appears to be false, independent assayers confirm that oil is pure and of good quality. Sharp rise in price amidst rumours of black ops and price fixing, as shares climb back up past 100
Day 8 21st - Frenzied trading sees shares climb and peak to a high of 691, before a small collapse again down to 492. Team getting on boat
Day 10 – 23rd – Maersk announces it has taken over Dekita as of 4 days ago, by purchasing 61 million shares at a price of 4,484 Million, with 75% in leveraged debt and the rest in operating reserves / cash in hand, giving them an additional 24% share in the company. Hidden investors and voting blocks take this to 58.31% of total share issue, and they have called a board meeting to propose a new chairman. Shares climb to 556 and steady there for the foreseeable future.

And another update done - for just this weeks story, see https://www.facebook.com/notes/kren-cooper/...55787172788964/

A page of notes, one single page unfortunately just seemed to grow and grow. Bad guys took over their oil tanker. The team captured the bad guys boat and got into basic negotiations. There was a single shot fired, and one gas grenade went off. But it still turned into 7K+ words and 11 pages of write up, and could have had more detail in it.

I guess pitch black corridors are scary when you don't have the layout maps and the party is split.

Next week, I'm really unsure if this is going to end amicably, or in a massive gun fight / magic brawl when someone looks at someone funny. Planning for both eventualities.

And this weeks update is done and published: https://www.facebook.com/notes/kren-cooper/...55808113318964/

My notes for this week were fairly brief - they were starting in a constrained position, and although I had no idea which way it would go, there was a fairly small decision tree to consider (at least at first).

So, what I had was:
Flow
Get the Bravos off their ship (or dead)
Get into the harbour at Baku and ensure offloading of the oil
If they go into Baku,
and try to meet with Germaine – G is annoyed with the team, so will add a 15% GAT tax to all deals
and try to meet with Turul – he is in Russia on a business-trip, for another 10 days.
Spook (Sing Wan) still after a killed-by-hand tiger

Along with that, was the stats of the 4 strong team that had borded, in case it came to a fight. They were roughly equal opponents - light security armour, a decent street sam, rigger, phys-ad and hermetic mage, optimised for water combat - flotation aids and scuba gear built into the armour, colt water carbines for firing underwater, waterproof vibro-knifes, that kind of thing. If it had come to a fight, they were going to trip the ships fire system and floor everywhere with sea-water or fire-fighting foam, and play that to their advantage...

Geraldine has a task: steal a painting from a Zeta-ImpChem management office in their local HQ – reasonably easy data steal, 15 story tower block on the south side of baku, just off the sea. If they don’t / won’t do this for her, then have her pull strings in baku and make life difficult for them all over.

If they stayed in the town, they were almost certain to call one of the two fixers they had dealt with. Germaine got Aswon his hunting rifle, which she did a very reasonable deal on because she liked him, and then set up a meet with a talismonger for them - but the team did not show up, which is the height of rudeness as far as she was concerned (hence her being frosty with Aswon). I put Turul as out of town to try and make sure the team saw him as the small businessmen with a side venture in black market stuff he is, rather than a big-time smuggler operation. Being able to send them to his very misogynistic and patriarchal brother also gives them a bit of social thinking to do.
Germaine is the local fixer - so they need to get her on side, and giving them a nice simple B&E job in the local area will be a nice break from all the driving around they have done, and give them chance to explore the city a bit more, and for me to add some local colour and flavour.

These are the notes I ended up taking during the session, that generated the narrative writeup:
Bravo calls, says “is this how its going”. Describe that several of the team are not in the bow. Kai says they should be. Bravo describes where they are, Aswon pulls back to bows. Shimazu spends 30-45 seconds looting the mage room (1 X 5 on magic background – some elemental materials)
Everyone pulls back except Kai, kai checks “has everyone moved?”, all feed back yes,
Tads asks “do we need to make sure they don’t sabotage our ship”. Kai asks how they are going to do the transfer
Physad out and great leap back to their boat, general perception – elf
Rest of team out, levitate Kai over, tads gets astral signature of enemy mage, they zipline back to boat and disappear
Check ship over for booby traps, Aswon takes gas grenade to reuse. All find the ship is fine, no damage.
Trying to work if they were eco-terrorist, mercs or runners
Search on the high roller – registered in Monte Carlo, won in a gambling game, currently owned by Fuchi
Query the crew on why they were there, trying to work out what was going on. Mindprobe the crew – no info – team was an “unknown quantity”
Shimazu has stolen 5 X F6 water elemental summoning materials
Kai goes to check captain – 7+4 X 1s, wakes captain up by tripping and landing on his cock+balls
Crewman fills in on activities, captain chills. Goes to report in to Maersk via radio – late arrival, boarders but repelled, no mention of team
Tads analyses spear, 3 @10 or more, gets that it’s a f2 with some unique enchantment
Discussion about setting up permanent base somewhere, plans of where to go / what to do
J recommends they find a nice hotel to rest up in, no danger
Drive towards Baku – to go shopping, get med supplies, get cover from civies
Discussion about staying in TCL for 3-4 months to get established – not dense population, some wildlands, corp enclaves, should be a shadow scene, Tads suggests mountain camp they were capture in to take – general disruption that it was too remote, others say no more than 1 hour from a town.
Call Gemaine “oh it’s you”. Germaine agrees to meet at the “Waterview Bar and Restaurant”, 8pm tomorrow, do a search, book tables. Book under name “Hai Rolla” with guest “Angora”, Aswon confirms details to Germaine, very curt response.
Where do we stay – we’re loaded for bear!
Shim called Turul – asked for somewhere safe to stay for 1-2 nights, with “good parking”
Turul call back to offer they can stay with his brother, just don’t touch his wives or he’ll cut their dicks off.
Goto turuls truck, old fashioned patriarchy

So, that's a more true (but brief) representation of Tuesday nights game session, but hopefully shows the essence of the adventure flow.

As ever, feedback is welcome!

And this weeks update is live at https://www.facebook.com/notes/kren-cooper/...55829502898964/

Continuing on from the previous week - they were back in Baku, and getting ready for the meeting with the fixer. This meant that there was an opportunity for shopping. So, I didn't have to prep a huge amount this week. It's a continuous source of amusement for both myself and Ali. She's the only female at the table, but is very dis-interested in shopping, both in game, and in real life. Most of the guys are gear freaks however, and are willing to spend hours getting themselves new shinies - it's a bizarre role reversal to the usual stereotypes.

Anyway - here are the notes taken during the session to create the narrative:

• Wake up at Nadims – chance of a stray woman causing a problem / aggro
• Hunter and Marius wake up, aswon hears nothing. Something touching Marius. She asks “help me”. Marius sits up and wakes Aswon. Aswon “you can’t be in here”, Marius gets dressed
• Nadia wants out, Marius “has a nice face” Who is your uncle? Establish this is Turul daughter. Marius face palm
• Nadim is in the common area, Shimazu wake up, goes to the toilet. Others go “SHUSH!”
• Marius explains they can’t take with them – but if they bump into each other. She asks for number, gets Marius personal comcode.
• She thanks, hugs, kisses, then sneaks to door.
• Nadim gets one of the women up to make coffee for Aswon, Aswon decoys to back door, Nadia gets back to room just in time.
• Tads summons spirit – gets sassy one that answers her back “can’t go in the house, wrong domain”
• When everyone is up, Aswon/Marius explain to Tads that he had to act like a patriarch to keep Nadim on side, ask her to explain to them why he said what he said
• Everyone breakfasted
• Aswon+ all other guys, buys suit, gets tie in Oxford Blue. Tads gets a long sleeve evening dress.
• Goes looking for talismongers and bookshops (Russian and psychology for Shimazu), Kai buys Financial Times etc to watch on local stock market – stuff about the buyout still in the news, attacks on Fuchi. Also look for info on legal systems, mostly westernised and permit driven
• Marius searching for encryption gear. White noise generators, etc – trawling boutiques – no more than encrypt/decrypt 2 in general. Get stuff with high flux ratings and power boosters – up to 8/9, no problem. White noise / jammers up to rating 4, 130% base price for local area.
• Marius R4 jammer, R4 white noise, under the counter
• Tads looks for talismonger, not found in Baku at all.
• Hunter looking for anti-coags, old hospital in the centre of town, newer one closer to the oil fields - Apixaban, med quality, 4k for 1 month. Warfarin, 2k for 1 month, poor quality.
• Aswon light wound gone, but detected odd tremors on biotech test ( – leftover from stress from toxin attack
• Goto meeting at 8pm
• Kai + Aswon start with Germaine, rest on table 3 away
• Tads makes check to find out why germaine angry – failed meet in Shirvan.
• Looking for gift for germaine – look for English stuff, failed (1), getting Kai to look for Antiques – not find any, fallback on the vodka as it’s at least authentic
• Germaine arrives, Kai fluffs antique roll – “costume jewels”,
• Dismisses Aswon, orders drinks, get sat down. “So you wanted a meeting”.
• Apologise for missing meeting, quiet sincere, very humble.
• Get drink, offer Russian Vodka. “HEEEENRY!”, chauffer take drink to the car. Pro bodyguard, but too far from germaine – team thinking he may not be alone
• Kai and Germaine talk, then G asks K to do a job for her, slides over the datapad
• Finish dinner, then do a drive by on the target, end session

I rolled randomly for the target of the young girl to account for tastes, and it worked really quite well as an encounter - I was particularly pleased with the response from the player of Marius, as he really engaged with it, and didn't just ignore her - if anything, he made the rest of the team facepalm when he started to help her. Definitely karma worthy next time we award.


What's to come:
I have two links prepared for the burglary:
Frame: http://www.skateglasgow.com/ornate-picture...picture-frames/
Picture: http://astridstoeppel.com/wp-content/uploa...m_-1024x812.jpg

I have a simple floorplan for the tower block, showing a basic layout that they will be able to obtain from the matrix to help with planning, and some simple details for the heist:
Gәncәli Plaza Baku

• 15 story building. Zeta Imp Chem have the top floor.
• Below is Baku Exploration (precious metals). Other tenants in the tower are SOCAR (State Oil Company of Azerbaijan Republic), Harris Pye group (pipe manufacturers) Interpipeline, Transneft and Unev pipeline. Similar companies being in the same place is a legacy from the soviet model.
• Reception has armed guards, double height mezzanine with many drilling / land based artworks.
• Tower has sealed windows on all levels. There is a lift access block on the top of the building, along with 2 X stairwell exits. Building has Type III maglocks, with rating 5 locks with AT1.
• The emergency stairwell is sealed from the offices by push-bar doors, with no external locks. The building is not rigged. CCTV covers the two stairwells, and the reception areas.
• ZIC has about 25 staff working in here, bursting at the seams, along with lots of the other companies.
• The artwork is hung in the office in the NE corner, and is 1m X .75m canvas in a gold frame
• Each floor has its own ward, contracted for separately. The ZIC ward is rating 4. Ward below (SOCAR) is 5. Common areas – stairwells and mezzanine has a 2

Pretty much this is going to be a very simple job for them - it's more a way of Germaine getting something she wants and proving a point than an actual mission with any risk. I'm expecting a bit of social engineering and then some simple B&E stuff - and I'm going to just let it flow.
Once they are done here, I'm going to see if they do want to set up a semi-permanent base in the area, and have a couple of options ready for them to pick from, and then see if they want to go para-critter hunting. With the score from the oil shares, they've got over half a mil sitting on a credstick, so they can afford some downtime, and some big stuff - it'll be interesting to see if they want to take a month off and get an enchanting workshop set up for Tads to make some stuff for the team.

A fairly brief update this week - only about 2.2k words. There was lots of OOC chat at the start of the session on where the group was going, the type of work they were looking for etc, and then lots of discussion once they had done the scouting about possible plans. I could have added a lot more detail about the chatting and planning, but I also caught nurgle's rot, and lost 5 days this week to a dose of flu, so it's a bit bare bones this week.

The notes for the session were also brief, based on the relatively low amount of action:
Aswon, Tads and Shimazu go for a scout to the target building, Hunter and Marius stay in the truck, parked in a side street
Checking security and such like – get a list of the companies, spot basic security and get an assessment. Find fire escape
Tads does astral scout and sees checkboard of different force wards around the outside, F1 ward over the top of the tower, covering all HVAC
Area = AA equivalent
Aswon plan – line to roof on drone, secure, levitate 2 X people up, breakin, loot onto drone, levitate down and away
Marius – call Milo, level 2, ID manufacturer in Istanbul. ID check, told him going freelance. 6 clean IDs, that would pass most civilian and low grade government checks – banking and credit. Marius offers to come to Istanbul to get the IDs. Milo warns it could be a month. No Trolls. Milo asked for basic specs on size/weight/race/sex etc to start filtering down database
Check roof for cameras – none
Sleep in the truck, recon run in the morning and shop for a deck



Hopefully, next week we can do the break in, get the painting and get back to Germaine to hand in, and have a Karma award. From there, Germaine can send them off to see the talismonger, and give them the location of 2 of the possible safe houses I have in mind for them, and they can encounter the third on the way to the talismongers:

1) ranch in the hills - the team will spot some Mafia heavies setting fire to the place, and have the opportunity to intervene to save the lives of the horses and families - and earn their friendship. They will offer the use of the ranch to the team, and it makes a nice rural getaway with lots of grounds and large outbuildings for doing "stuff" in.
2) concrete factory in north west Baku, big silos, echoing concrete halls, lots of space, cold, some background count areas from slave / child labour
3) the old Odeon cinema in northern city centre, lots of peeling gilt and faded velvet, end of the golden era of 2d - a musty mausoleum to film. One free spirit – old man, smells of popcorn, died in the audience and became a (benign) ghost - no matter what radio station or trid channel they are watching, it will flick over to "old time" music and content.

Just about finished the writeup for this week - just needs to be SPAG checked, posted and then added to the master writeup. But, here's the notes from the run:

Go back to building for about 05:30, park about 5 streets away in a car park, empty enough this early
Tads – put your burka on!
Vending machine guys at about 6:30-7am, Security guys at 7:30, first office staff at about 08:30
Send watcher spirit to observe doors, instant response – ward is tied to doors
Wait 20 mins for stun to go on Tads. Marius checks for rigger systems and wireless / matrix control – lots of conflicting wireless, thick walls, faraday cage – surface mounted cable, outages will not be noticed possibly
Kai gets jammer from Marius. Tads goes for a scout, checks for alarm wards – nothing, Stairs unwarded, including getting out into the roof space – door is not warded
Call Germaine to see if they can get some auto-lockpicks – busy. Auto service calls Kai back, says he wants “stuff”.
Plan to put a fake in – check for print shops etc. Germaine calls, arranges to meet kai for lunch at the restaurant – prawn salad! Marius checks, finds the junction box – real mess, no records, no labels
Hunter checks on frame – bespoke, old fashioned, hand crafted, well-constructed
Fozzy botch check on antiques. Meets germaine at lunch, gets “old” lockpicks in velvet wrap, go to hardware store and purchase locks to practice on, get box and packing materials.
It’s a Tuesday, Shimazu practiced lockpicks all day and night to get to 2
Wait overnight, infiltrate about 5am, Aswon plants det cord on comms lines – success, Tads gets successes on levitating Shimazu – all ok, not spotted
Invisibility infiltration of kai at 08:30, tailgates someone in, waits 10 mins by security desk, checks around, knocks over a display piece drill, then gets into rec room and plants first smoke
Sets smoke 1 for 16:07, second one in the gents loo in the ceiling time 16:09, go up to 10th floor. Plants 3rd smoke for 16:04.
Marius finds parking spot for deploying condor later – covered as a vehicle delivery company, Aswon and Hunter find spare clothes for Shimazu
Call G, arrange to meet G in 30 mins in suburbs
Get in, get painting and bag/ laptop, back to the roof, put onto the drone. Get shooed away from the parking area. Jammer and WNG on, escape and evade, for 1 hour. Kai checked painting – appears genuine. Painting has no tracker, stolen laptop does – disabled.
Germaine slashes and checks new painting, well done all, they say they want safehouse
Nadia to call, she is shopping with her brother, but he often goes to the bar and lets her wander, so she has an hour, maybe two when she won’t be missed.
Marius agrees to meet with her

Expanded out, this turned into 7600 words of Narrative - it's amazing how much fluff this is around the events that needs to be covered off.

No update this week - or next week - due to real life shennanigans getting in the way of our gaming.

So instead, a few questions to throw out there, and a couple of observations.

Question 1.
How many people enjoy the writeups, or get any value from them? In fact, do people read the actual write up - or just read the post here?
I see the page read counter going up, but after the first two responses, I've not seen anyone else posting on the thread, but I assume that people must be interacting with the page in some way for the number to be going up like it does.

Question 2.
Since episode 45, I've been starting to post up the notes I make during the session, and some of the prep / stats / background information about the game. Is this as interesting as the main story? More interesting? Surprising? Does it give you ideas for your own games, or make your teeth itch because you would want to see it done differently?


I would genuinely like to see more feedback - or any feedback - on what I'm doing here. Whether that be questions about where I'm going, or how I do things, suggestions to make things better, observations on gaming / GM style, or ideas to throw into the mix. Partly, I would have to admit is a certain amount of narcissism - it's always good to see people responding to your posts, and to have your work acknowledged. Balanced against that is the fact that not a single one of you owe me anything at all, and I have no reasonable expectation of anything from you.... hey, I live in the real world too! But I also think that things like this can be genuinely more useful when there is a melting pot of ideas and some kind of feedback loop - and you never know when you will get a really great idea or a line on how to handle something around the the table from something raised or responded to.

I love entertaining my players, and try to add aspects to the game to throw things in - like getting on of our former players who moved to London 2 years ago to Skype into the game session as his character to act as a Johnson, with a soundtrack of a gunfight getting louder and louder in the background until they "had to go now", or rolling out an A1 sized map of a warehouse for the players to plan their mission on. Equally though, I love when I get to throw in a description of a room, a character, a situation - whatever it is - that takes the players on a journey and makes them feel immersed in the world. And if you can throw out a plot twist or situation that makes the players gasp or feel that they really have uncovered some mysterious conspiracy, then that's fantastic. But that's a lot of hard work to achieve and pull off. If I can help supply inspiration, ideas or a kernel of an idea to someone else to help them do that, then it makes these worth doing. Equally though, it's really good to get feedback on plot that makes you look at the situation with a fresh set of ideas and a different headspace, and consider new ways to take the campaign, adventure or even just a scene that could help to achieve that goal.

So please folks - if you have feedback, feel free to share. I'd much prefer this thread to be a melting pot of ideas that are more useful to everyone, rather than a monologue from me.

Kren

Quick Reply - I love these, they are awesome.
Read them when they go up.

Keep up the good work

And another update posted, first post updated with new page/word count, and PDF updated in the dropbox. Hopefully back to weekly updates after a bit of a gap due to RL stuff.

This week, the players had to deal with the runaway daughter of one of their contacts who has got a crush on the rigger, and then decide if they were going to get involved in a strong-arm operation on the local horse ranch. Fortunately, the incredibly moral shaman was the one that actually saw the man being doused in petrol, so intervention became inevitable at that point.

Here's the notes from the run, that led to the story:

• Nadia is browsing in a department store, in the middle of town.
• Driving to centre of town to collect Nadia – call her to advise her to get to car park
• Tads trid phantasm truck to look like a removal van before getting to store – 8 success F6. “Nadia Removals”
• Nadia climbs into the front and snuggles Marius, Aswon goes into the back, Shimazu ignores her.
• G calls, says she has found two places, brief description, sends top picture through to team
• Kai asks Nadia where she is going – “staying with Marius”, oh – “ok”. Nadia is 19. Marius does not physically respond to her presence as he is jacked in.
• Nadia and Tads discuss “witch”, she says to call her “shaman”
• Kai gets tea and a biscuit for Nadia, story time. Hunter sends location of turnoff to a village to Marius and asks for a turnoff. Marius ignores
• Nadia not religious, bitter about her life, mostly due to her uncle. Chatting with her about her life, uncle, her father, the business…
• Discussion about how to get a message to her father to say she is safe, take her seriously, but at the end of the day – Marius problem. What? Eh?
• Tads notices mob hit on farm, they detour, massive stunball drops 5/8, marius rams with truck, shimazu slice, hunter shot, last one gives up, Shimazu check the barn – BGC=5, Aswon take man in to wash off petrol, dog in kitchen, rest of team deal with the mobster.

The farm they have found should end up as an alternate safehouse for them (unless something goes really weird):
Safe house one – horse ranch, at Shirvan, Mob hit, needs a rescue, pledge eternal loyalty etc. Large horse barns, in the hills, off the main road. Small family –Rusudan Avaliani (Male, father, 41, Orthodox), Naena (wife, 39), Eteri (daughter, 19) and son (Vardo, 16). Lost money for a while, facing shutdown – they have a dozen horses left.
Attacking are 8 members of the local mafia, a mix of orcs and humans, armed with 4 X KS23 Shotguns (7S), 4 X SMERSH-4 SMGs (6M, BF) and some Marakov MP71 pistols (5M) and about a dozen incendiary grenades and some fuel cans. Between them they have some registered SINs, keys for a pickup truck and a sedan, some PAYG phones with half a dozen names and numbers, and a certified credstick with 2K on it. Hamad Dejeti is the leader of the local mob and one of the thugs.
https://i1.wp.com/www.twentytwokilos.com/wp...esize=676%2C380
https://i1.wp.com/www.twentytwokilos.com/wp...esize=676%2C380


The photos sent through of the other possible locations are:
The concrete factory and the cinema

Hopefully this week will be the interrogation of the mobsters, and then probably them ending up in shallow graves, then pressing on to meet the talismonger and get some magical supplies for Tads. After that deciding which safehouse to go with (or which combinations), and I imagine that will take up a week or two as they go mad on "base building" and kitting out. They may even settle long enough to do a bit of enchanting and training!

Just made it under the wire with this one - game night tomorrow night.

6007 words added to the story - a lot of notes on this one, mostly due to the magical shopping trip. However, the players have now hit an important break point as far as I'm concerned. They now have an enchanting shop, and one place where they can have a permanent base. They have two other locations to check out. I can see them wanting to stop, for a month now, to allow the enchanter to get to work and make some stuff, sometime soon. The other major thing is that they've discovered what the spear is called that they found in the horror lair, and now have a name to follow up on. Be interesting to see if they do, or if they put that on the back burner like they did with the top trump card they got from the Ares team.

The reason I've had a hard time getting this one done - I was at a LRP event over the weekend, so spent most of Friday-Sunday running around in the snow, doing photography and monstering. We also filmed a cool "Lady in the Lake" scene (it was a rehash of the Camelot plotline - see this youtube clip if interested!

Anyway, here is the notes for the session:

• Get the guy woken up, cold shower
• Go out, get the guys family safe, pledge eternal fealty to kai
• Initial talking, azerbaijaini, hard to explain, ask about horses, crying
• Aswon goes to make T, dog attack, latch on, no damage, guy calls it off when Aswon emerges from house.
• Get the story – trads, translate spell, 7 success
• Get family inside
• Shimazu and Hunter drag bodies to side of house. Guy defaulting on pistols and serious stun – shoots in buttocks etc. Hunter helps him execute mobsters with Tads “supervising”, Kai and Aswon are inside along with all of team except Marius
• Marius, talks to Nadia by the truck while rest of team are occupied – what do you want to do. We’re going to Constantinople – do you want to build a new life there.
• Nadia flirting, Marius finding it hard to resist – Nadia wants to be free and have self determination.
• Team conflab near van, move vehicles out of the way
• Kai suggest they tell the guy they will stop by from time to time – use him as a bolthole.
• Advise him not to tell neighbours or anyone else
• Tads donates some oats. Learn they are ranch holiday owners
• Give him the number of one of the mob phones – text, call in emergency.
• Kai says they need an ops manager for the base they are about to set up – Nadia agrees and shakes on it.
• They say they will teach Nadia to shoot, and defend herself.
• Tads advise Nadia to think about changing name
• Team takes the 2k credstick, leave him the 3 vehicles
• Drive towards the talismongers – old oak growth, straight lines, clear ground, feels like a bit of England,
• Top of the rise, see a windmill, turn near it and park up. Kai, Tads, Shimazu go in. Aswon, Hunter, Marius Nadia in truck
• Tads assenses Aslick – mage with a weird side, Shimazu feels like a Shinto vibe, bows to building, Aslick notices and likes.
• Nadia snuggles with Marius and strokes his hair lovelingly…
• Shinmazu drops masking and lets him assense – he says nothing directly useful, but will keep eye open.
• Purchase 1) shamanic lodge, F10, 9800 – two sets, 19,800
• Purchase 2) warding materials 20 Force points, 35K
• Purchase 3) create water, Force 3, 4.5K
• Alleviate allergy – F6 available, not wanted
• F8 mind probe – too high
• Influence – F6 and F9 available – taking the F6 and 9k
• Sterilise - F3, .45k
• Vehicle mask – F5 and 7 available – takes the 7 after negotiation
• Physical mask F4 - .6k
• Examines – Shimazu sword – at least 1000 years old, hand mined and made
• Enchanting shop – 100k, not yet, changed mind for the package deal
• Do you need a courier to constantinople? No, no need
• Aswon enters, smiles, Aslick freaks, tells him to go. Shimazu works out from the smile
• Consultancy, 1k for analyse rock lizard blood. Needs to be kept cold
• Offers all spells for the rock blood, will buy critter parts for 5k of lodge materials
• Agree 150k, spirit to make windmill turn to get power to provide power to charge up cred reader
• Look at spear, get full details from a magic test – told him the story of where it came from.

And the NPC, with the most unfortunate name, was described from:
Aslik Mustafan
Talismonger, contact of Germaine / Tads
Grotesquely fat man in a wheelchair – no legs, following an auto-accident. Morbid fear of cyberware
Grade 2 mage but down to Magic 3 following some horrific accidents / astral combats – now does not actively run, just talismongers a little and deals with magic supplies.
Category Force 3 Force 6 Force 9
Combat 5/6 4/6 3/6
Detection 2/6 2/6 1/6
Health 5/6 5/6 4/6
Directed Illusion 3/6 2/6 1/6
Indirect Illusion 5/6 4/6 2/6
Control Manipulation 2/6 2/6 2/6
Elemental Manipulations 4/6 4/6 4/6
Telekinetic Manipulations 5/6 1/6 1/6
Transformation Manipulations 6/6 4/6 3/6
Magic gear, available up to F5, all at 180% book price. Enchanting shop available at base cost.
Fetishes available at 75% base
Ritual sorcery materials at 80%
Spell formulas at 150%

The spells were rolled as requested, on a D6 with the first number being the chance of him having them in stock at each band of force, just to keep things interesting. Interestingly enough, the players didn't bat an eyelid at the 180% base price on the materials...

And the latest session writeup is up - a little late due to being on holiday for 5 days, but can be found here

Background notes for this week:

• Plan to go to Tbilisi, 450 klicks
• Call to Georgi Kolarov, talislegger, going to be coming through town tomorrow, heading to Constantinople, nothing to take there, something to bring back – about two weeks. Georgi warns cargo may be hot – very hot. Needs decent wards. Asks about Anatoli Chevenny – he did a dodgy deal, had to lay low for a week or two, agree to meet for lunch
• Trip to Tbilisi, about 96kph, 450km journey, about 5 hours
• Aswon goes to hammock, full of guns from hunter, Nadia taken his place in the front
• Aswon, Kai, Tads, sleeping, Hunter and Shimazu awake, Marius driving
• Nadia tries to make smalltalk with Shimazu, he tries to avoid convo, passes her lock picking book, he reads psych.
• Nadia moves to talk to hunter, makes small talk – gets practice with Azerbaijani, gives advice on disguise. Hunter learns Azerbaijani 1.
• Aswon gets up, Shimazu goes to bed, Nadia curled up to sleep next to Marius
• Uneventful journey, arrive in Tbilisi, out of town retail park, McRonalds, get breakfast
• Plan to do meeting, then shopping.
• Aswon and Tads on bike, going for a look around, steep hills around, interesting air landing
• Limited route choices due to hills and terrain
• Aswon and Tads do a drive by of café, south side of Tbilisi centre, trams with conductors, no busses, plenty of cred readers, spot military unit passing through. No parking near the café, about .25-0.5 mile walk
• Kai gets hunter to check for heists in local area – nothing moving they spot.
• Kai checks on the borders – low level war zone, kurds vs turks, avoid travelling as the military truck
• Manic traffic to Tbilisi, mental traffic / driving. Journey takes longer than expected
• Georgi – heavy set man, late 40s, black curly hair and a beard, leather jacket and jeans, chain smokes cheap cigars.
• Park in car park, tip the attendant to look after truck, nothing heavier than a pistol.
• Order coffee for all, after handshakes, low levels of magic activity, fairly busy area, Georgi checks everyone out with a good long stare.
• Sava stew for lunch, decent meal, checks team over – who is the muscle, who is the shaman etc
• 50-100nuyen per head for bribes. Target will be hot, large, magically active
• Georgi goes to buy more cigars, leave the team to discuss the job – generally no problem some concerns over the ward / lodge being high enough force.
• Pay for the shipment is offered at 50K, can offer some wiggle room in 2 X F1 sustaining foci
• Georgi wants a golem… goes to 65k. meeting in the hills, can offer some cover – e.g. dropping trees behind him, F1 sustaining foci thrown in if a hot pickup.
• Gets a new number for Anatoli

Fairly straight forward this week - an uneventful journey to the capital, then a meeting with a contact. No unexpected complications, no surprises. They've taken a job to do to fund their trip, and it's all good. Most amusing was that Jez (Aswon) failed his magic background check, and thus Aswon doesn't really know anything about Golems. Jez knows plenty, and is wondering if the team has taken on a job that will be too hot...

And the next installment is up on Facebook as a note and saved into the master document - though not added into the PDF linked in the top post yet, that will have to wait until I'm home tonight.

One of the players was absent (Lee / Marius the rigger), so the session was a little less busy. Still got a little side quest dropped in, and this will get them a tie back all the way to sessions 1+2 - the militia that helped them out of the Chechen prison they had been detained in.

This was the notes file that generated this weeks writeup - a pretty simple encounter with bad weather, and a random act of suffering they could either help or ignore.

• Go looking for market, random 1,6 – market day, delivery of new stock – low cost, get variety of fruits, get basic story (Hunter, Russian)
• Team buys outfits to fit in with local populace, from market stall
• Kai goes looking for porn, finds some with an 8, buys 10 “publications” for 500 nuyen
• Shimazu buys 500 NY of booze as well – 20 bottles of clear spirit
• Tads finds talismongers in tblisi – lots of expendable spell foci in the form of straw men
• Heading north out of tblisi, catch the rush hour,
• Go up the mountains, all make body checks ok, up to height, start seeing snow and ice, get about half way to border, hit blizzard, eventually pull over
• Blizzard stops at about 2am, -10 with windchill, -2 without, drive on, 1 success, lots of buried cars
• Get about 3 miles, find a large pile up – truck jackknifed and blocked the road, wedged inbetween the barrier and cliff
• Aswon checks cars, first ok – though scared by dreds
• Second car, person with hypothermia, frozen to steering wheel, peel first hand off, some damage
• Tads checks people in the truck, both fine, as well as other vehicles
• Biotech – person near death, treat for hypothermia +shock, get out of cold clothes, start to warm, tads makes survival check, starts to work, tads heals their hands
• Tads mountain spirit, F4, 2 successes – clear the road
• Hunter – navigation check, fails for finding alt route
• Tads, air spirit, F4, success, clear the road
• Road clear about 10-12m about an hour before dawn
• Raid wallet of the man in the snow, Nikolus Harid, tool company employee, lives about 10 miles to the west, south of the main road – Hunter finds info
• Tads goes to scout village / town, gets feeling of being watched, can’t find the mans house
• Goes back and looks for tiger – finds it, it spots her, compulsion come to me, tads breaks free and heads back to truck.
• All get out to go speak to truck driver except nadia and marius
• Kai rolls a 1 on Russian talking to truckers
• Wake up the people in the cars on the other side – kai banned from talking
• Get all the cars moved, tow out the damaged car, truckers ready
• Truck stuck, try to pry free, Tads new summon F6 mountain, 2 success
• Get truck pushed out of the way ok – truckers scared shitless
• Last service – get mountain spirit to help get them down the hill

Hi everyone. We had a week off, as we were two players down - probably a good thing as I've been crazy busy with work. However, here's the latest installment, published to facebook.

And here are the notes behind the action. It certainly didn't go as I'd planned / expected -but that's what happens when your face gets a complete botch on his translation check when confronted by armed enemies - so just adapted a little, and now they have a repair bill to suck up some of that windfall cash they got. Maybe he'll spend some karma and raise his Russian from 1 to 2 now...

What I had initially planned to happen was that they encounter the soldiers on patrol, establish they are not the enemy, then come to their aid when a chechen insurgent band tries to take them out, thus securing their friendship and being able to source some APDS and AV ammo from them.

Notes:

• Down to the town, using a spirit to trailbreak, still dicey travel
• Down into the town, Hunter thinks a deadspot. Marius fails sensor test.
• Tads – astral scout, sees one person from one corner building to another
• Get into town, get spotted by the “Dimitry” the copper, greetings,
• Get the guy back to his family, emotional reunion then she starts scolding him
• Dimitry starts to ask them about the truck, warns them that some might not like it.
• Kai asks about way to look less Russian – D laughs
• Kai asks where they are – D says “aleresso”
• Ambush – truck is being lased, Aswon and Hunter spot laser sources left and right, Tads spots about a dozen very faint life signs. Kai pops the top “hello, please don’t lase us, don’t be rude” – but rolls a 1.
• Warning shot passed Kais face, Shimazu tackles and drops Kai
• Marius accelerates, Tads casts levitate on one of the carl gustavs, the other one fires as he comes under magical assault – hits the truck with a round, Marius tries to dodge, gets a couple, takes an M
• Roll init:
• Enemy first, fire 2nd carl gustav, hit for 13d, buys a success and takes a light
• Two riflemen aim for the tyres , take them out with bursts, but run flats kick in
• Other 8 soldiers hold their fire, aim at the truck
• Aswon heads through to the back of the truck. Shimazu get pistol ready, wait for orders
• Hunter, aims for grenade shot on the left hand gustav gunner
• Kai waves a white hanky out of the top hatch
• Marius powers down
• Tads clears spell signature
• Keldara sink back into the snow once reloaded
• Kai gets winter coat on and pops through the hatch, they hear the chopper coming
• Chopper overflies, then circuits, goes to ground effect and whites out.
• Jenkins, cowboy boots, safari jacket – accuses team “Dirty Islamic fuckers, get out of the truck.”
• “We’re not Islamic, we’re not those people”, Explains that his Russian is awful
• Compliements truck / driver for the missile hits
• Tells people to get out of the truck, bark of command,
• Shows people where his turf is, sends them on his way
• Fire the truck up, and head back to the main road

Just as a side note - I have no particular problem with Islam / muslims (no more than I do with any organised religion) and I fully intend that at some point fundamentalist christians will give them some grief - so don't read anything into either the notes or the context of the story beyond it being "bad guys with those characteristics operate in that area"...

And this weeks update - another one squeaking in under the wire. This new job is killing me....

This time it ran roughly to plan - the journey went ok, they did sensible stuff, right up until they got to town - then the captain went for the most expensive option to get the truck fixed, and offered them even more money to do it fast. Well... at least the team will be keen to take on more work if he keeps spending it like this....

Here are the notes from the run:

• Session starts- chuntering about translation. Kai defending himself against people wanting to gag/ chipjack / lecture him
• Handling check, 1 success (bad conditions, serious damage, run flats) – slow going and the truck shudders. Tads calls 2nd spirit to have one on each wheel
• Head west, small but growing chain of vehicles in the wake, about 3 hours to clear the military zone
• Start changing front wheels to mid, nadia and tads clearing snow, kai is teaboy
• Kai calling ID forger – calls Ngo Ding Diem, L2 ID forger in Vietname, general fake IDs for the medical team – after R4 IDs. She needs another 10 days to get something together. 4s for the medical trustees, 3 for the others
• 90 mins later, back on the road, heading west, convoy starts up again
• Tads suggests having a donation from those following
• Start to descend, round mountain, snow fades, snaking road
• Pick up speed to 40, 45 mostly ok, 50 bad
• Research on finding a place to fix the truck, 10+7 on search, get all 3 options
• Get basic info on the city, Renarku hotel, Azzie casino, Fuchi(Europe) casino
• Kai calling option 2, finds English speaker, do you have money? Yes, ok, we stay open till 8 for 200.
• Uneventful journey to shore and south, coastline hotel, build up slowly, astral view looks ok – CBD is warded, otherwise not
• Truck stop – ignored for now, saved in the sat nav
• Team arrives at the garage, sucking between teeth, offers 60k, 2-3 weeks. Kai tries to get him in the truck – looks uncomfortable with the idea
• Get into town, more description, then phone call from saito
• Ask how quickly they can do stuff – they estimate they can do 5 days but it will cost 100k
• Sound of breaking glass, Tads hears the fire, Hunter hears body through window of house on fire
• Kai offers 110k (blowjob offered), but down to 4 days. Pays 50% up front, then 25% at half and completion. Then ask for runflats
• Hunter tries to call fire brigade – discovers there is none.
• Tads goes to scout – 25 mins each way.
• Shimazu chain calling Odemoyd, trying to get through –
• Tads casts stunball at S from astral – takes effect, but drains – bad guy stares and assenses, Tads assenses and gets weird, warded, shielded, and odd, essence 8+
• Tads pulls back
• Team go to book in to a low end hotel
• Tads described the giant, they get the language – Iranian, something about infidel scum.
• Hunter gets Turkish and Georgian Berlitz courses

And this is the "research" for the area, most of which they got - except doing more research on the various garage / places to get the truck fixed. They also didn't check into the local crime scene at all (yet) so this will feature this week coming I think...

Head west from mountains, drop down to coast, follow coast road south to Batumi – first decent size town that has facilities that can work on the truck. Distance about 195km.
Batumi – 2nd largest city in Georgia. Rail links and ship port, light manufacturing, food processing, some shipbuilding. Main activities for the city are gambling and tourism.
City size = 180,000, Mostly Orthodox, some catholic, Muslim, Jewish and Armenian Apostolic.
‘International’ airport, facing the sea, single runway, 2500m long – ok for widebodies with light loads, not for heavy loads or suborbitals.

Varn Kulkachev – local crime lord, head of the local mafia. Has 80% market share of crime, vastly weathly by local standards. Lives on the big hill, reached by the cable car. Extensive defences on the hill otherwise – including mines.
Encounters
1. Band of beggars, close on the truck, climb on, climb in, steal anything not nailed down.
2. Drunken driver, crash into vehicle – police involvement, bribe for lost paperwork = 10k
3. Vehicle inspector – tax / paperwork. Permit costs 25K, negotiation 4, charisma 3
4. Black market dealer – various drug offers (all recreational, none combat / operational use)
5. Fixer, offers a meeting with “mr Kulkachev”, for a delivery mission north into Ossetia of prostitutes
6. Call from Saito – pocket dial, getting beaten up by the hunter.


Repairs
Repairing the truck – 6 boxes / Serious = 30% base price. Base price = 150,000. Base repair price = 45K. Base time per box = 16 hours. Target number = boxes+2 (. Parts = 1k to “repair” tyres, 1.5k to replace with truck tyres. Avail 4, 2 days for repairs, Avail 3, 10 days for heavy duty truck tyres
Worst time to repair the truck = 12 days.
Repairs 1 – “Car friend happy garage”, poor English, poor tools, ok-good job. Will work with team, fears local crime lord, still independent, cheap. Build/repair skill = 3, +1 to test from poor / cramped conditions. Price -20%
Repairs 2 – “Batumi Heavy transport”, good English, in the pocket of Varn, will report back and get the team hassle, steadily rising cost estimate, will plant trackers. Build/repair skill = 5, +1 auto success to test from having very good facilities. Price +20-40%. Karol, English speaker
Repairs 3 – Batumi shipyards, moderate English, will have staff that report to Varn but will take time. Good tools and loads of space, but unfamiliar with vehicle. Build/repair = 6, no modifier, price +10%

Well, I managed to get this one fired out double quick - but that means I don't have to panic at the weekend. Here is the story from last nights game... I wonder if this was an "easy" one to write, as so much of it was downtime stuff....

This weeks story is found here, if you don't want to download the PDF.

It was karma time - the team got awarded the following good karma:
Aswon 14, for a total of 59 earnt
Hunter 11, 51 earnt
Kai 12, 54 earnt
Marius 13, 58 earnt
Shimazu 13, 55 earnt
Tads 12, 61 earnt

With that out of the way, I told the players that if they were staying in the hotel suite, reading and keeping a low profile, we could fast forward the 4-5 days until the truck was due to be fixed, they could work out their karma spends and we'd crack on. If they wanted to play through though, and go and do "stuff" in the town, then we'd see what happened to them. In the end it was mostly a fast forward, as they were doing very sensible stuff, laying mostly low and learning skills.

Here are the notes on karma spends / activities - not all of which made it explicitly into the writeup, as they were either not done to completion yet, or not really referenced as an activity.

• Tads – build shamanic lodge – F10, lots of overtime
• Aswon – lots of runs, systolic breathing, research on demo and survival (demo, survival) Paracritters at 1 for free, improved strength phys ad
• Hunter - Raising computer 3>4, get georgian and turkish at 1 (4), navigation at 1, get drugs from hospital
• Shimazu – Psychology 1>2, Talismongering 0>1, Paracritters 0>1 (free), initiate, get traceless walk
• Marius – parts shopping – comms extension to trailer, fold out bunk for trailer, rolling tool chest (lockable) for trailer, some kind of safety harness to rig in the trailer, firearms conversion kit – etiquette test at shipyard, after two days gets comms and tool chest, not the rest. Takes hunter with him – gets a 9 on a charisma, and 2 successes on Georgian. Gets a “1st officers” bunk and 3 rifle sizes firearm conversion kits, ammo bin, one heavy weapon conversion kit, gives 2 X recoil 1 springs for getting his brother “Teren” across border into Kurdistan. Azerbaijani 0>1 from talking with Nadia whilst shopping.
• Kai – gets Aswon, Shimazu and Tads and go to an abandoned guest house on the edge of town, pinky swear, stare at the stars, get the avatar. Aswon initiates – learns masking from Shimazu. Shimazu initiates – Ward specialist, Tads not initiate, Kai initiates – Masking.
• Kai – raise int 5>6 – one success, buy one more – halves training time from 82 days to 41, due date 10th march. Spray painting 0>1, Talismonger 0>1, Russian 1>2, Leadership 2>3, Biotech 5>6 – 21 days of training, running concurrently with int upgrade, working on pistols 2>3

Two of the players got Paracritters as a background skill rating 1 for free, based on their numerous encounters with them, and them having picked up some knowledge by osmosis (or headbutting, which is totally the same thing right?)
As ever, feedback, thoughts and opinions are welcome, as are suggestions!

This weeks update just gone live - https://www.facebook.com/notes/kren-cooper/...56070327968964/

A lot of this was written in a field very early in the morning (I help out at a Live Role Play event in the UK, and it was our first large event of the year - just about killed us all as we had 3 days of intense glorious and uncharacteristic sunny death beams) so apologies if if doesn't flow as well. However, it ended up being a slightly larger than normal update, strangely enough.

Here are the notes that went behind the story:

• Nadia action – all ammo gone through and sorted into sets, organised by calibre, then subdivided into grade – cheap Russian / Chinese, then Chezch / Balkans, then 1st world. All the demo has been wrapped in greaseproof paper and weighed. Armour has been sorted by type and manufacture, and required fixing materials. Truck has been programmed for all scheduled maintenance and mileage checks, and a list of approved 3rd party parts.
• Hunter and Marius find out that stuff has been sorted. Marius praise, but don’t mess with my deck
• Aswon takes apart all the shit ammo to make demo supplies, makes plans to upgrade rifle. Marius and Nadia go out shopping and doing couple stuff – get her some armoured clothes and a phone, go to the trid, get junk food and back
• Aswon and hunter go running, Kai training, Tads lodging, Shimazu physical training,
• Tads, name changing, have to change to be right for the area, half-baked explanation
• Nadia learns edged / close combat from Shimazu/Aswon in the evening
• Nadia and Marius get jiggy after training.
• Envelope delivered by bellhop, gold leaf and calligraphy, residents of 1205, castle, 8pm party tomorrow. Black tie, discrete pistols only
• Hunter – discrete search on Mr Kulkachev, nothing found in 6 hours. Shimazu go find the hotel staff
• Etiquette passed talking with the hotel staff – background on the guy and the crime empire.
• End of day 3 – go to bed worried (except Nadia and Marius)
• Start of day 4, get location on suit hire – black tie suits are 5k to buy (1/1), or 500 per night to rent
• Truck due to be ready at 5pm, meeting at 8pm
• Marius getting the assault rifles ready to mount. Hunter route planning, Nadia sleep in,
• Garage call at midday, parts delays, team RSVP, details of cable car station,
• Perception check heading to the cable car – spot Eden 1
• Get to Cable car, spot guns and lasers
• Aswon talks to guard in the car, shown gun and armoured clothing – punch the guard at his request
• Shimazu bodyguarding Kai – no threat. Nadia mirroring the other women.
• Spot the killing zone on the hill + monowire+sensors
• Bad art around the place, waiters, drinks – Aswon (Brandy), Hunter (vodka Martini), Tads (fruit juice), Kai (Mineral water+slice), Shimazu (Mineral water_slice), Marius (White wine and lemonade)
• Marius – corner with Nadia. Aswon on stairs watching, Tads in the garden, Hunter by the fountain, Kai and Shimazu looking for damsels in distress.
• Aswon – people never seen African / hair, genuine curiousity
• Tads - talks about plants
• Hunter – avoids name, talks in Georgian
• Kai – talks about antiques, big up the host
• Marius+Nadia – Marius takes lead after Nadia pauses, Marius internal comms to N, warns her not to give too much away

I've made up and printed off a character sheet for Nadia now, she's a little low on build points compared to the rest of the team, so I may need to pad out her background skills a little - but she's certainly viable as a replacement character I think, in case we have an oops moment. Mostly though, I want to make sure I play her consistently... I'd decided to have her be a little organised, and this let me play with two of the players heads a little, who initially thought that bad guys had broken in and bugged or booby trapped their stuff - then I got to play the turnabout card on them.

I've still not decided quite what to do with Nadia:
She and Marius have "gotten together" - no mention of precautions were made. Could she be pregnant?
There's a definite relationship now between her and Marius - how far will this go?
Will she get captured / kidnapped by BagGuys™ and have to have Marius be all heroic and save her?
Will the team get captured and Nadia gets to be an empowered and viable female leading character and rescue them all in a gender role reversal move?
Will she head back to the base they are setting up and become their logistics manager and facility caretaker whilst they are away?
Will her dad find out where she is, and blame the team, turning from a friend to an enemy?
Decisions, decisions....

Any votes from you folks as to what to do with Nadia?

Awesome Kren...

What to do with Nadia? SO many possibilities.
I vote for Organizer /Facilitator for the Base... As for the relationship... lets see where it goes

Session 059

Facebook link for the update here

Notes from the session:

• Get inside and grab buffet
• Spot people approaching the throne, getting their minutes in, clear zone around
• Kai locates the constable hanging on the wall – worth a lot, 500 years old, studies intently
• Aswon talks to guard to find out the process. Looks for seat, and sees none, then goes to mingle
• Kai looks for uncomfortable people – see none.
• Marius talking with everyone to get names and faces, Nadia talking to get backstory
• Pass the time, waiting for their go
• Approach varn, get the chip in the puzzle box
• Aswon asks for contact – told to keep to the coast road
• Aswon talk to guard, get comm code, will be back in a few weeks
• Tads spots the other team under concealment – they stop and stare at her
• All go to cable car, guard asks if they are leaving early – doing a job for the boss
• Spirit in the cable car – tells them to shush, then heads to the zeppelin
• Split and head to hotel – manager checks on the bill and gets the bellhops woken up to help pack, Kai, Marius and nadia to garage – find the two bugs on the truck and remove without making a scene
• Marius checks the rigger box, looks all clear, instructs nadia to help him jack out if he spasms.
• Start getting stuff sent downstairs, Marius inbound with truck, Aswon gets cash ready for tips
• Marius warns Hunter to make sure there is space left in the truck for the +1 for the passenger to the next town (Teren)
• Bug scan stuff as they load the truck from back scatter – AOD shuts off
• WNG turned on, as they get on their way, discover the band used was ULF – bottom end mil tech or high end security gear
• Go to spice garden, get food, scan gear they are in, make the call for Teren, get him to come to the foodery
• Check over the trailer for bugs, nothing found. Team very paranoid now about bugs…
• Teren gets in, looks worried, asks for cards
• Tads finds the bug in the first aid kit, throw out into another vehicle
• Kai says “no cards!”, Aswon plays patience
• Teren teaches Aswon to play poker, go past refinery, get to border crossing , get waved through courtesy of Mr K, get to Trezbon, drop Teren off at the bus station in the CBD near the hotels – he heads to the casino, kai throws him the cards
• About 900km to Constantinople
• Nadia snarky about sending message to her dad
• Pushing on to get out of contested territory, 300km to get to Samsun. Bug scanned again before entering Samsun
• Scan the truck, all clear, Nadia fixes the program to scan the ULF band
• Plan – research the destination for Varn, do that first before going anywhere near their actual location, planning a detour to try and get the AoD triggered

What I had planned:
Dinner party – light buffet, mingling, further conversations with the hangers on. After about an hour, the other team enter through a side door, exchange of cred sticks – other team looking unhappy at doing so publicly.
Then team is called to see Varn, general chit chat, then calls up the police official and the councillor to discuss some trifling matter, to show his importance. Then ask team where they are going in such a truck. Ask them to take a chip to Constantiople – a one time cypher pad for comms with his friends there. No pay, but maybe they can do business in the future.
Nothing else planned, they are dismissed soon enough, can mingle and do anything proactive they want. Party ends about 11:30, then queue to get back down off the mountain. See other team wandering past under spirit concealment heading to zeppelin. Zepplin will come past them, jetting off as they get in the car.
Down to garage, all work done ok to reasonable standard, truck is ready to go, fuel tank topped off. Heading out of town on coast road is ok, no problem.
Get 20-30km out of town, police checkpoint. Sgt there waves them to customs inspection, tells them that Mr Kulkachev wishes them well… then on the way.
Along the coast road, like the eastern shore, guest houses and hotels, run down, lots of pollution. About 60km from Batumi, major chemical plant, all burnt out, BGC3-4, source of massive slick of chemicals and the ruined coastline. West of here the sea is not so bad.
Go on further, first proper border checkpoint, R3 scanners, guard bribe=200Ny per head, possible chance to sight APB for Nadia?
On to neutral ground, chance to run into militia / kurds / army force on manoeuvres, equal chance of each, can be bought off with food / medium bribe / alcohol etc.
About 200km to next border.

Smuggler session 60 is published here

Notes from the session:

• Samsun main square, Tads – apologises to team for threatening to use magic to go tell Nadias dad.
• Marius going to sleep, Hunter taking over
• Team find a trode net to order – wait until 8am for store to open – Shimazu purchase for 1k (plus dildo) Hunter got a 2 and a 1 on his written Turkish, and a rubbish computer roll for purchase…
• Leave Samsun heading along coast road about 8:30, Shimazu driving, spot the army truck. Truck comes past doing about 150-180ish
• Further on, Hunter spots the other truck and paramilitary types throwing themselves flat
• Continue on to Sinope, Hit a cow near sinope, drovers shouting, ignore
• Move on until they hit the traffic jam, doing about 5kph, approach to Sinope.
• Traffic stops, about 11am, final
• Knocking on door – small child with flowers, passes over random coins (50 nuyen)
• Surrounded by horde of kids, aswon shakes door, knocks a bunch off, some bloody noses, crying, angry adults
• Woman approaches, weird mix of emotions on face (Shimazu + Kai), women offers to broker deal with kids, sends kids away for 100 nuyen,
• Paranormal leeches – kai buys 2 jars for 1600 nuyen, haggled down from 1k per jar of 3.
• Tads notices start of ritual sending, say goodbye to Ceeda, close door, break TN
• Listen to local traffic news – get details of bus crash in centre of town
• Truck coming in, knocks door off hinges on other car, truck burns past them
• On nox, vehicle armour on the front – 8-9 points, nothing on side or rear
• Hits 2 X pedestrians for insta kills
• Turns right, through buildings, smashing a path, towards the power station
• Kai looks for Ceyda, she gone.
• Team makes guess as to terrorist action against the power station
• Marius pulls out into other road to follow, no problem
• Tads warns about ritual tracking
• Follow the other truck, come through the ruined houses, get through the gate
• Hearing check – Aswon hears the chopper incoming
• Hunter shoots LAW at rear of truck – falls short, does M damage to rear
• Chopper gets lock on truck, truck fires, chopper dodges
• Aswon hears growling from ahead, Cluster munition goes off, kills truck
• Do a u turn, exit stage left, Tads does a trid phantasm to cover escape, BGC=2 at gate, white articulated lorry, 3 successes on force 6
• Head down power station road towards the road jam

What was really going on:
When I was checking the Wikipedia article about the town, I saw mention of plans to build a nuke power station there in real life - which gave me the idea below:

Sinop, regional airport, 40k population, home to Sinop Nuclear power plant – with 4 X Gen 3 PWR reactors of type ATMEA1 built by Mitsuhama. Kurdish strike team attempting to breach the perimeter of the reactor complex and attack with satchel charges
Team overtaken a fair way from Sinop, very similar vehicle, no trailer – boosted for speed, extra ram armour on the front. Spotted nearing Sinop, on the side of the road – paramilitaries scurrying for cover. Heading in to town, road block in the market, one route through town – kids selling flowers, proper tailback, medicine women with leeches (J) – spotting for officials – will give the truck careful scrutiny. Claims awakened leeches with magical powers. Attack on the nuke, armed response, explosions all over town, cops with 9mms, gunned down with overwhelming firepower.
Frigate off shore launches chopper, will escalate to firing SLAMs with cluster munitions to target the strike team. General chaos, armed response coming from inland.
SU 83K Chopper, Handling 4, Speed 110, Accel 12, Body 3, Armour 2, Sig 4, Auto 0, Pilot NA, Sensor 2, Cargo 1, Load 20, Seating 1, Entry 1d, Fuel jet (250l), Econ 0.25km/l, L/T Vtol, Chass Autogyro, SI 2, Avail 4/10 days, Cost 65K,
Mini-turret with Vengeance MMG with AV, 2 X pylons with Outlaw Block 3 (20D AV) single shot missiles
Oliver Perry SLEP-Mod B, Handling 4, Speed 45 (20), Accel 4, Hull 4, Bulwark 3, Sig 3/5, Auto 4, Pilot NA, Sensor 6, Sonar 4, Cargo 5000, Load 50,000, Seating NA, Entry 4d+1f, Fuel Jet 40,000l, Econ 0.15km/l, Chassis Frigate, Cost 100M
Aircraft facilities X1, Medium remote turret (light naval gun with 500 rounds, 8LN), Medium remote turret (Victory autocannon with 2000 rounds, 20D), Torpedo launcher with 10 reloads, 4 heavy launch control systems with 12 missiles (SLAMS), 60 Basic living amenities, 20 improved amenities. SLAMS = 50m radius, cluster munition, 12D AV

Session 061 is up and posted here: https://www.facebook.com/notes/kren-cooper/...56133753563964/

Events:

• Edge out of gap – Marius needed a reroll,
• Tads suggesting get to somewhere and then let them try to complete the ritual tracking and see who / what is going on
• Kai asking about spell design for a “detect ritual tracking”?
• Do we want to be targeted in the city or in the backwoods, talk about being in urban = more options for the enemy
• Heading in to town, stuck in traffic. Spot chopper overhead doing an active search
• Chopper scans the truck and gets one success – coming back for another look
• See tractor and trailer of cops coming out of town, look for empty place – see nothing
• F6 spirit told to add to concealment of truck by reinforcing,
• No other big traffic on the road, chopper comes back for a 3rd pass
• Truck goes dark, Marius EW test, reduces footprint to 0
• Chopper satisfied for now, heads into town
• Still stuck behind ¼ mile of traffic heading to into town
• Aswon checks on Nadia – do you want a dink, Kai says stay there, Nadia wants a wee
• Tads gets out to check – no trace of ritual magic at Tads,
• Checks leeches – less food in the jar, but no other change, then Shimazu, then his sword
• Kai spots Ceyda crossing the road ahead, no one else spots her, gets out of truck and runs in towards her
• Aswon and Shimazu get at least half out to watch kai, Tads checks for rituals – none on kai
• Chase ceyda, offer to help her, she refuses, gives her his number, then she leaves, heading out of town
• Tads checks aswon, no trace, gets a sense of his gecko tattoos being strong
• Policemen led over to where the pc-1 was, then go check on cars, they get pointed to the truck
• Policeman gets a 1 on his English, tells kai to STFU, hunter speaks, tells them about the fruit seller, she was heading out of town, policemen relays to military, chopper heads south 30 seconds later
• Tads checks Hunter – no ritual trace
• Policemen gets out and chases after ceyda, after getting out of traffic with some scraping
• Debate – go back or wait for traffic to clear. Now midday, dusk at 5pm. Traffic jam will take 7 hours to clear
• Some people turn back, kids start selling food and drink, some just get out and play cards / draughts / tiddly winks
• Gets to 5pm, spirit goes, not replaced. Gets to 6pm , just before 7pm, start to move
• Roundabout closed, burnt out bus in the middle, fire foam, alternate road through back gardens
• Out of town, ok, few miles out of town spot a Roadblock, ID check on Marius and Shimazu vs R3 ids, no problem
• Get to Bartin ok 10:30, push On to eregil 12:30, find Travel lodge near the steel mill

It's a bit shorter than normal - but that's mainly because the team sat in a traffic jam for 8 hours rather than taking the tasty diversion and plot encounters I offered them. Oh well.

Still - Ceyda Mills is still at large, and the team are now on the radar of the Kurdish Freedom Fighters. The team also have two jars of magical "bloat" leeches. And they've now parked next to another "strategic national asset" in a foreign army truck and gone to bed.

Wake them up with a military force kicking in the doors to interrogate them? Have them under surveillance? Or let them get on their way to Constantinople? Decisions, decisions...

Episode 62 is now posted here.

So - a short week for us, only 3.5k words written. After a week off, and following some LARP events, it was someone inevitable that there would be off-topic chit chat. Better to let it run out and have a short week, than try to call the players to order and "force" them to RP - at least with this crowd.

Here are the notes from the session:

• Lack of sleep – WP test for all vs 8s (6s for Aswon) or be very irritable – Aswon and Shimazu failed, everyone else succeeded
• Room 1, Tads, Aswon and Hunter, Room 2 for the rest, room 1 opens
• Aswon, spear in the face, old man says he’s here to talk, then they recognise
• Explains the detail of the job – aSwon asks why, he says that Marius probably knows
• Explains some more – other team horrible accident. Gives Kai 1 X ID on paper.
• Shimazu asks for help sleeping – earplugs given
• Marius goes looking for breakfast – find an eat-in place only with mega strong coffee.
• Breakfast – Sucuklu yumurta (eggs with sausage), black bread, jams, cheeses, hazelnut spreads, coffee or tea (no water)
• List of research: Steelworks and who runs it, regs, past misdemeanours. – decide not to do that one
• Hunter does one research, Nadia does the other – both successes. Shimazu goes back to bed.
• Get the background info on the steel mill, pension and town. Order some clipboards for local delivery
• Exit the motel and get Shimazu into the truck to sleep a bit more. Research finishes about 1:30pm
• Discussion about the “translate” spell
• Hunter and Nadia do research, Tads does spell research, Aswon, Kai and Marius go shopping / language learning and Shimazu sleeps
• Market team – perception checks, spot the tail. Marius calls in a mugging to the local police, keep following. Police race towards the heavies and the team break LOS.
• Walk up to the front doors. Present ID and give spiel – Turkish roll (4) – pass
• Introductions, meet the plant manager, Hunter and Marius on the wind up
• Kai explains that they want to speak in English for their “guests”
• Driven up to the entrance – stop

Next week, I'm planning on them doing the "inspection", and finding a few things they can try to get some extra bribe money for...
In the mill they will encounter the following “issues” they can use to negotiate
1) A worker caught just tipping cleaning acid into the drain when he thinks he’s unobserved
2) Two steelworkers slip and spill some molten metal, which starts a small fire – but the fire suppression system doesn’t work properly
3) Someone tipping sub-par materials into a crucible to “top up” a batch of steel
4) Air scrubbers in the hot-rolled steel line are not being run to save power
5) There are at least 8% of staff that don’t actually exist – they’re invented by the HR manager and a cartel of the supervisors to claim pay.

This weeks writeup is now live on Facebook.

The mysterious old man from the mountains in Iran turned up at their motel and gave them a mission:

Cleaning their rooms in the morning - a middle aged man – middling height and thin, wrapped in cheap and tatty robes, and carrying a wooden corn brush, a very old dusting fluffer with a worn wooden handle. Battered sandals flopped with every step onto the concrete floor, and he walked with a slight stoop.
Mission – go into the steel mill. They are the Turkish department for Environmental affairs, come to do this years inspection for dumping of chemicals / pollution. They are to take the bribes, in fact welcome them. Be greedy.
He has a wooden stamp and an ink pad to authorise the inspection documents, which he will give to the team.
If they refuse, a minute of hard staring then mention “I thought you would be willing to help me in the future, to assist me in some way, as long as it didn’t cause you harm, or cost you anything?”
The steel mill is well guarded, and has competent security – good sensors and electronic guards, armed security force, has an army rapid reaction force. Not good for dealing with brazen “in through the front doors”
Steel mill manager “Bahri Pollat”, mid 40s, worked at the mill for 20 years, used to bureaucracy and infighting, will hint at bribes and show the “inspectors” around, trying to steer them away from certain key areas – the nastiest polluters, which are also the magically guarded areas.
The team will need to blag knowledge of steel production, Turkish culture and legal systems too successfully complete the blag. They will be offered an opening bid of 50k in a suitcase of cash / bonds / shares. With very good negotiation they can move up to a bid of 100K, which will take a few hours to arrange.
Tour order
1) Production office systems, orders, backlog, raw materials
2) HR / Admin, H&S facilities (perception test to notice nervousness (10s for most, 8s for Kai - #5))
3) Coal, ore, hematite and other raw goods areas
4) Water ingress, pump house and substation
5) Boiler house
6) Furnace (spill and fire - #2)
7) Hot roll mill and Cold roll mill (air con not running properly - #4, additives - #3)
Shaping and cutting (worker tipping stuff away - #1)
9) Storage yard and supplies
10) Goods out
Notable by their absence are the lack of tours for the cleaning / scouring of materials, pump house out, sewers, air scrubbers and chimneys, all of which will have noticeable failures
In the mill they will encounter the following “issues” they can use to negotiate
1) A worker caught just tipping cleaning acid into the drain when he thinks he’s unobserved
2) Two steelworkers slip and spill some molten metal, which starts a small fire – but the fire suppression system doesn’t work properly
3) Someone tipping sub-par materials into a crucible to “top up” a batch of steel
4) Air scrubbers in the hot-rolled steel line are not being run to save power
5) There are at least 8% of staff that don’t actually exist – they’re invented by the HR manager and a cartel of the supervisors to claim pay.

They caught most of the issues, but didn't choose to follow them up - so they didn't get as much bribe money as they could have. On the other hand, there's less suspicion. And as they were away free, I let them find the forest, get all focussed on talismongering and then threw them the social curveball to see what happens with Shimazu. Will he rat Nadia out to her father, or will he stay on her and Marius's side?


Here are the notes taken during the session:

• Into office, it geek, projector, death by PPT, aswon asks about exports, “grease” the wheels, actual inspection
• Go through hr – notice “nervous”, don’t do anything. Golf carts, get rebreathers and hi vis
• Kai gets bribe at the ore heaps
• Spot the fire – pointedly ignore it and drive past
• Into the rolling mill – notice the aircon not working
• Spot the additives
• Spot the crucible additives
• Say they have to go to the nuke plant
• Spot the tipping – dither, ignore, takes the team back to the office
• See rock on his desk – geode, Tads 6+5 on geology, not suitable for magic,
• Back to the gate, talk about the fire team – sarcasm
• Aswon says his people will soon order half a million tons
• Back to the truck
• Empty the briefcase of cash and throw away the cheap briefcase
• Checking the gems – unvalued at this time, mix of precious and semi-precious, 30K
• Get to karasu, get into the wildlife preserve
• Look for visitor area, only 3-4 hours from destination
• Find, all closed, magic users check for talismongering
• Marius calls Andre to arrange lodgings – checks to make sure its him, arranges to take him out for dinner. Arranges to meet next day, avoid the north bridge
• Kai calls Ngo Dinh Diem – chasing ID
• Others go an establish area is bad for talismongering near the roads and visitor centre, but off the track will be good, no major critters
• Ngo arranges to ship IDs to Constantinople, will text him details
• Tads checks for magical tracking, spots possum/monkey – some critter powers, takes a photo
• Shimazu spots tads, spots monkey, offers oats – spits out, tads create food – peanuts, fills jowls and then jumps off into tree
• Spot the sensor in the tree (20+17) relay to the others,
• Rangers coming – aswon hears the electric microlight, waves, circles,
• Ranger – local guide, good patter, Amal Juttamk
• Kai gets Nadia to call home on Marius phone, GPS turned off to prevent tracing
• Ranger says to get air filters on the truck to stop pollution, passed on details
• Turul calls Shimazu, asks for help finding his daughter, sounds genuinely upset. Shimazu agrees to “keep his eyes and ears open”, and doesn’t give anything away.
• Now 5pm, end session

This weeks update is now live on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/notes/kren-cooper/.../?fref=mentions

Notes from this week:

• Discussion about Nadia – did he actually say to call him, he did? Oh…
• Shimazu suggests telling him that they saw her in Constant, after they leave – rest of team “no no no!”
• Well we’re not dealing in people anyway, right?
• Heading to Korfez – the puzzle box is in the lodge in the faraday cage
• Discussing calling contact for drop-off – Grandfather Otto, morning meet – then Kai said no, only 10 minutes warning. Tads – is it worth going in a cab, instead of the truck.
• It’s Saturday today
• Talk about splitting the party, in case it’s an ambush
• Hunter think about OC – story about Triad message, chopping off arms and legs
• Kai about OC – that’s particular to Triads, we’re thousands of KM
• Do we contact the quest giver – no, indicates lack of trust, he operates on his word
• Tads summons watcher to go find the cemetery to do a scout, come back to truck stuff
• Get to truck stop – showers, restaurant, overnight spots etc – eat, drink, clean
• Kai and Marius in the truck, spot the blue truck (2 X 9s up each), they call Hunter
• Truck then pulls away to other end of car park
• Marius launches condor to observe, stealth 17 on sig 10
• Tads go astral to check the truck – std force 1 perm ward on the vehicle
• Sensor check – Marius spots artics coming, Hunter spots the Merc from the car park, Aswon sees some and goes to high point – 11 on stealth. Shimazu gets a 10 hiding in a curtain sider 3 down. Truck on left is container, right is a curtain sider
• Artics box in, but uncertain.
• Truck is white artic as per nuke plant
• Scan the truck ID – “see that one”
• Double check, confirmed computer check, pull out guns and fan out
• Stunball, cast as M, affects most but not all, with an S, Aswon takes the shot and shoots the gun of the one at the back.
• Marius hears “rape everyone inside” – triple 1 on his Turkish
• Stun ball again , drops nearly all, one escapes as he dives into the front of the truck. Hunter jumps down one side, Shimazu DFA from the other, stealth approach with a 13 on the other side.
• Hunter goes to the one at the rear, dude in truck by the time he gets there.
• Shimazu knife to throat of the front guy
• Get him into truck, Kai say “stoppit”, guy not really understand
• Aswon spots police drones inbound
• Guy says “you attacked us- 3 months ago.” Kai works out that is before the team got together “we stole the truck”
• Police drones get onsite, call for Kai / him to stop and put hands up – they do. Aswon goes for the truck – starts to move it, warning shots in front of Aswon
• Marius shooting at the police drone
• Aswon jams extendable staff on accelerator and then bails out.
• Front drone riddles the truck, HV fire, drops it. Hunter shoots it with grenade launcher, does an M
• Marius riddles the back with twin assault rifles, kills it, Kai and the trucker dive separate directions
• Hunter shoots with a burst vs erratic drone, makes it explode
• Tads reshapes trid phantasm – flat plane overhead
• Cops coming up after the truck. Shimazu good check for driving. Nadia hides in bunk. Cops follow – truck is changing colour, about 60 metres back
• Shimazu limits the speed, cops follow, Marius lands drone
• Spots the driver pulling out of the fuel station – make dodge test, miss collision
• Heading for the on-ramp
• Condor picks up chopper inbound – news chopper
• Tads does invisibility, 4 on a F5, both truck and trailer, on light stun (ignored). Marius jacks in, rams up the jammer and R10 power amp, then takes control of the vehicle and goes to max normal speed
• Disappear into the clutter of houses on the side street, spot the hospital – Aswon spots, they drop jamming to avoid killing people, Aswon can then call Sing Wan. Tads sees her watcher spirit
• Aswon calls sing wan, get her to hire a decker and trash the cctv at the truck stop, she asks for 500, he pays 1k and a promise of some wine
• Thoughts about disguising as a fire engine – find a video to show tads, then start looking for more models for vehicles
• Now about 7pm, travel until 7:30 – Tads has a F6 7 successes on fire engine

And all of this weeks action came from what I thought would be a short RP piece and a chance for Kai to do some negotiations.
Head south towards Korfez, into the rest stop – fill up with gas, however mistaken for a bunch of truck thieves / pirates by a shipping firm, blocked in and threatened – police may come, ID checks. Company is “Yurtici Kargo”, a national carrier for Turkey, armed with shotguns and private security licence. The teams truck was actually used to attack their company before, when in the chechens control – they have the licence ID on file, and it triggered the computer in one of their trucks.
Have up to a dozen trucks / artics box them in – stuff big enough to keep them in place, and more and more drivers appearing in an angry mob unless they get things resolved quickly.
http://www.kobi-efor.com.tr/lojistik/yurti...yasi-h5906.html

I'd thought we'd get into the city and possibly do the drop-off for the package in the graveyard, and then get to the ID manufacturers - but no, it turned into a massive shootout. *shrug* You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink...

Still - should get into the city next week, get the package dropped off, and then get to their contact and get measured up for IDs - and we'll probably stop and do karma too.

Smuggler session 065 is up at : https://www.facebook.com/notes/kren-cooper/...56238083428964/

They made it to Constantinople, met a contact from the past, learnt some things about the city, did their delivery and settled into their safe house for the next 2 weeks - so a pretty productive evening.

Here's the plot notes:

• Discussion – get the clothes or not? Not.
• Get to wacky races booth at the edge of Constantinople – see IDs being scanned – discussion about what IDs to use
• Aswon spots Lionheart – mini brief
• Gets to booth, give ids, handed back, give back with 500 bribe, accept and through
• Motorbike from side, no good options, sideswipes
• Saracen – spots and wubwubs. Over to Marius, advised 800 nuyen bribe to truck.
• Aswon goes to offer bribe, rest back into truck
• Sofi sends trooper to set aswons hair on fire
• Follow them to café, aswon finds good stuff, introductions
• Sofi says to change plates, aswon says about
• Tipoff – sashsa gray, otto
• Aswon shows purdey, offers to get escort to north
• Background info on the north bridge
• Talk to otto, arrange meet, goto north, walk to south side, tactical deploy
• Deliver to otto, checks puzzle box – all good. They leave, shitting bricks
• Call Dimitry – leave message that delivery is done
• Call Marius mate, leave message, get to dinner late, order food
• Find location on the west bank, get the top floor
• Get 3 keycards, then back to truck,
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bosporus#/media/File:Bosphorus_yali_bergie.jpg
• Shimazu try Saito – number does not exist
• Shimazu – text Turul, “no sign of Nadia, but have you seen Saito”

They also got some karma awarded, which immediately triggered discussions of "can I afford to initiate again" from the Magical folks I wonder how they'll handle the next 2 weeks of game time - will they go for some downtime and do it abstractly, or will they want to get immersed into the underground of the free city. I suspect the latter...

Session 66 is now live and up at : https://www.facebook.com/notes/kren-cooper/...56252694123964/

It felt like a weird session this week. We only had two "encounters" really - the visit to the ID manufacturers, and the visit to the garage - with a little twist thrown in for the cops pulling them over, I suppose. But it also felt like we got a fair bit done - I think because Karma was awarded last week, and now several people are initiaiting, and they've identified the skills they want to learn and start training in.

I've worked through with Ali away from the table the list of spells she wants to learn, so that's worked out in advance - she's mostly going to be stuck in the trailer learning stuff. Tom's character Shimazu is going to burn 4 days getting his grade up, so there's a chunk of stuff he won't be doing, and Aswon will be spending 2-3 days on his. So, with only Kai, Marius and Hunter really "free" for the first week, I would imagine they will be spending time on their skills and doing general research and planning. The 2nd week may see the team wanting to get out and do stuff - but we may actually advance the calendar quite quickly for a session or two, until we reach the heist itself.

That being said, we're also probably going to be off for a couple of weeks due to school holidays, LARP events, and other stuff - so updates may be a little sparse for a while.

As ever, comments, suggestions and feedback is always welcome - as are questions about what is going on, or why stuff is happening!

This weeks notes:
In Constantinople –

• Breakfast – chat about to do list. Change plates on vehicle,
• Aswon chatting about pay to Kai – offers to waive non-combat days D6 1-2 =2, 3-4=3, 5-6=4 karma, gets 2, rerolls to 3
• Go to first meeting with ID at 6am, leave the lodge at the house
• Get to milo, converted house, scans, talk about coming back every 2-3 days for the duration. Reveal Tads body scars.
• All give reasonable / truthful answers, get to lunchtime, told to come back at 6am in 2 days time
• Dropping off Tads, Kai and Shimazu. Tads and Shimazu working on initiation. Kai working on selling the shares and bonds. Kai warns about the steelworks and the chance of their stock.
• Marius, Hunter, Aswon and Nadia go to find Sasha autos – get scanned by a police car enroute and the tags picked up…
• Copper pulls Marius and Nadia from vehicle, ignore Hunter and Aswon in the back. Nadia says they got married, ID sent off and not back yet. ID scan of Doctors without borders – fails check (3,1,1 vs 4,5). Confrontation – blag about truck history and offers to pay “fine”. 500, goes to 600 for cash. Drive on to garage
• Get to Greys, 3 bays, cars on jacks – rimjobs. Oily assistant, whats wrong with truck – lionheart recommends us
• Aswon is blunt about hacking plates – gets told to sit on the truck. Go in for coffee – not captain boy scout
• Tell history of truck, we’ve not been caught. It also looks like a Russian army truck- want cosmetic reshape, and PVP. /How rich are you? Who can vouch for you?
• Agree to look at smart materials. Get a 7 seater loaner – pooh brown. Gets 15k down payment, Nadia upset at how pretty Sasha is. Mention trailer, recompute. Drive back to house – journey ok. Lots of chanting. Nadia flounces off as they talk to Kai
• Fake licences – 10k, PVP 20k for truck and trailer, 15k for smart materials for shape changes on the truck+5k labour. Will take 7 days of work on the truck and 4 days prep.
• Aswon initiating – g3, no ordeal, 16 karma – aiming at Kai…
• Marius goes to room – door locked. Nadia angry – you flirting with Sasha! Marius offers to go shopping with her – it’s a trap! Then they go off. Buy outfits, and hat / sunglasses for disguise
• Have tea, sleep overnight, breakfast, training, initiating, putting recoil mods on the drones
• Sasha calls at midday, gives price, arranges for truck / trailer to come up.

Following the award of Karma, they have the following plans:

• Marius – raise S and WP, Azerbaijani from 1>2
• Kai – Raising Russian from 2>3
• Shimazu – initiate to G4, Ordeal – Thesis “The art of the sword”, 9 X 1.5 = 13Karma, 4 days per thesis
• Tads – spells and quests
• Aswon – initiate
• Nadia – undecided yet
• Hunter – electronics, electronics B/R, Edged, thrown all at 1

New episode up at : https://www.facebook.com/notes/kren-cooper/...56289678488964/

This week we managed to get through 6 days of IC time in one night - a new record for this campaign. Lots of training time, some background stuff, and a bit of shopping filled up most of the night. There was also some chat around a revision of the ammo types that I'm introducing to all of our SR3 games

The notes from the session:

• Kai – asking Tads what is she doing for the next 2 weeks, time for talismongering?
• Afternoon of 3rd – working on drones, treatise, learning language, breathing. Sasha sends tow truck for the trailer (extra 250 Nuyen)
• Tads speaks to Levi, arranges access – competent but slovanly
• Nothing happens on the 3rd, through to the 4th. Shimazu asks Hunter for buriable strong box – underground telecoms junction box for instance
• Nothing happens on the 4th, through to the 5th
• Get to ID manufacturers – background footage for old CCTV records. Nadia suggest burial in graveyard. Nadia finds electrical reseller selling junction boxes, extendable batons, food-stuff
• Marius calls Sasha, adds remote control to truck, +12.5K – Marius pays by transfer. Hunter training on throwing and melee
• Kai, left luggage, central railway station, brown attache case gold handles KQB initials – get the IDs
• Shimazu finish initiation, geas, astral perception – touching sword – does not take metamagic in hopes of getting psychometry later.
• On to 7th Feb, no random events, Marius calls contact – Andre, asks for Weapon dealer, gets passed details for Orhan Pamuk – Turkish Dessert Restaurant (Marius, Hunter, Nadia,
• Drive over in the galaxy, 4 homes knocked together, homely, some smoking, left with menus, order a standard meal, bought out in random crockery, reasonable food, nicely spiced – desert bakalava is rubbish though.
• Finish meal, head outside, round to the blue door, kisses nadia hand (learnt it on the trid)
• Colt Cobra TM110 – SL2, suppressor - FN Eagle, 2K X2 (1 for nadia)
• 1 MGL12 SL2, 1MGL6 4.8K+6.6k
• Franchi Spas 22 Smith+Wesson AS7 – 3K
• Ares Pred II Smartgoggle+Silencer 1K
• Dikoted throwing knives Non DK, 2.4k for 20 heavy shurikens
• 2 suppressors for areas alphas, shock pad 2K
• Silencer for a hunting rifle 1K
• Walther M2100 Enfield L99A1, cold weather adaption, thermo, 30K
• Sabot – 180 per 10, up to 8 boxes 3.2k
• 8th, ID ok, then more training
• 9th uneventful – go to visit Ohmar, lunchtime, quiet 3 X APCs
• Bill 58K, offered 60K, half up front, +mini grenades, collect on the 13th
• Very slow on the way back, massive loop to avoid funeral crowd

I also put together a little diary to track events, and also gave out the IDs from Ngo - so far the players are unaware that they *all* have a flaw on these, due to the rush job / remote nature of their construction.

01/02 Arrive, Delivery to Otto, get to house
02/02 6am start at ID, Visit Sasha, Shimazu starts initiation
03/02 Midday, Sasha calls truck details – getting ID sorted, get trailer to Sasha
04/02 SG-Prep on truck
05/02 6am ID, then bit of food shopping, extendable batons
06/02 Midday-Shimazu finish initiation
07/02 go to see Ohmar, weapons fixer
08/02 6am ID, SG-Start on truck shaping
09/02 pay for weapons
10/02 Midday – Shimazu finish 2nd copy
11/02
12/02
13/02 6am ID, collection of guns
14/02 IDs ready
15/02 Truck is ready
16/02


And the IDs
Encounter 2 - At dropbox, there is a package waiting with IDs – Rating 4 sticks – all have a flaw (P126 Sprawl Survival)
Kai Dr Arban Erdene, Chinese / Asian, Male, middle age Expiration date 4/7/2060
Aswon Dr Chege Keanjaho, Mozanbique, big appendix scar, Dead Man’s Shoes
Tads Rgn Illona Astaruu, Surgically rebuilt knee – limps, Limitation (Russia)
Hunter Dr Julian Barnham, St Hildas, Oxford, Major Goof (post op TS)
Marius Rgn Kleiner Kampf, membership of German National party (Deterioration, 1 point per 4 months)
Shimazu Professor Sang Po Yi, Chinese national, membership of Red Book society (Evil Twin)

We've had a few weeks off due to Live Role Play events and some overtime at work, but another writeup done, another session complete - the text can be found at this location

As usual, here's the notes taken during the session, so you can see what actually happened, rather than what's in the story....

• Start of the 10th, Marius asked do we want more work? Aswon and Kai say “No!” – we have a hot sniper rifle and a hot golem, let’s not borrow trouble.
• Avoid warlord on the way back – Marius say that he’s in the book of grudges, he’s going to have to be dealt with.
• Knock on the door, swarthy morrocon, “Please, I need TP”, Kai fetches, hands over, Shimazu assenses, lots of cyberware in head, sense of urgency.
• Everyone back to training, Hunter goes for workout in the garden and has a run around.
• Ohmar calls Marius on burner phone, “are you being funny”, as Marius answers with funny voice, do you have big/small people, no modded grips, quiet afternoon, Marius starts to teach electronic b/r to Hunter
• Shimazu calls Turul to see if Saito has been in touch, no – seen Nadia, no.
• Kai checks on Nadia – she’s learning about bugs and surveillance, cryptography, night of the 10th quiet and without incident
• 11th – Tads, random encounter – crump on way home, tired from ritual, failed handling check – do on way home
• Shimazu spots battered green Renault van, passing the house twice,he does a workout in the garden, spots it again after an hour, tells the rest, Aswon goes to watch, about 40 mins later spots the van, 3 success on assensing – vague feeling of badness. Marius checks to see if it’s a good vehicle disguised as a bad – nope.
• Team gets into gear – how to handle it. Aswon, tree, rifle, stealth (10). Marius watches the van, goes to turning bay, reads for 10 mins, then turns and come back. Van comes back, drives back. Marius continues the surveillance, they do some trading, then come back to do a drive by again.
• Hunter went to cover Tads. Come back, red light run – Tads completely surprise, Hunter 1. Hunter soaks 6S, Tads takes an M. Hunter slides and rolls then comes up, walks towards the car. Car gives thumbs up and starts to reverse, Hunter shoots 2 X SA shots – does 2 X M damage to the car windscreen – guy claims he was pulling over. On traffic cam and locals are on the phone to the police
• Marius gets Aswon into the MPV – green van just passes the house, Marius calls and informs Shimazu. Nadia, Shimazu and Kai get ready for an assault – just in case. Nadia gets cooking oil spray and a lighter…
• Traffic stopped around the junction, watching the theatre. Tads sterilises and cleanses. Turkish bike cop turns up, demands them to stop, Hunter gives R4 id, check 4 vs 0, cop calls in and says he needs a firearm investigation unit, and an ambulance. Tells them to wait. Sergeant coming. Hunters R4 id from Ngo is now logged as being involved.
• Pair of cops arrive, want to take gun into evidence bag, start gathering evidence
• Marius calls local precinct, busy, calls dispatch, “I’m from the Turkish intel agency Millî İstihbarat Teşkilatı, MİT (556 on int agencies)Matter of national security, gives detail of incident, two operatives on important intel gathering have been sabotaged by a foreign agent. Fast talk (default to charisma), rolls 11+10, buys 2 successes. Hold please
• Marius coaches Hunter via comms, cops get a message on the radio, senior one to go to car, Hunter looks at corners nervously. Agent “I need a phrase to verify ID” – ok, who is the worst footy team in the world, Basictas.
• Cops pop their boosters and “get on the floor”, guy freaks, cops go mental. Blam blam. Hunter runs with Tads,
• Marius shuts off phone and turns off. Gets up there in 20 mins, gets Tads and Hunter into car, Aswon diagnoses Tads injuries ok (5), get back to house ok.
• Kai and Shimazu doctor – have rerolls to avoid making it worse, get her down to a L, magic away
• 12th – morning. Marius plan – get truck on PM of 15th, load up, go get guns, then go get golem, then leave town. Aswon raises the point that Ohmar might not sit on the guns for long – Marius checks, and no. Aswon also reminds people they need to give 24-48 hours notice for the golem. Kai says – not giving notice until the truck is actually back with us.
• Shimazu asks Nadia to look for heavily armoured attaché case for his 2nd thesis –
• Watch news – details of trouble in the east bank, firebombing of a mosque, respected Imam dead from fundamentalists. Tads triggered – runs out, Nadia follows.
• Hunter goes with Tads and stays at garage to guard her. Marius doing taxi duty. Aswon arranges meeting with Sofi for a social.
• Evening of the 12th – noise from downstairs, green panel van outside.

Tomorrow night, they get to deal with the intruders from the green panel van and find out what's going on - and depending on how that goes, we may get the weapons picked up and find out that the police and intelligence services are hunting them down for their little jape...

Well, another few weeks break due to real life getting in the way of gaming, but hopefully now the summer holidays are over, we'll be back on track for a couple of months until it all gets silly for christmas.
The write up can be found here
Here's the notes:

• Marius – arms up. Kai – arms up. Shimazu – armouring up. Tads – F4 city spirit, 3 success, light stun, Hunter armour up, Aswon sneaks out for a look
• Stealth (Aswon 5), good perception check - half a dozen, small arms, heading up at speed
• Shimazu goes to push lift button –gets spotted, they spot him alert on the stairs. Tads checks the van – empty and nasty,
• Team hears the bad guys whisper to each other on the stairs, start to move up the stairs tactically, both sides still holding fire,
• Marius warns his contact – asks if he needs to send the fire brigade, then leaves them alone
• Team waits, starts to see the intruders. Shimazu gets into the lift, goes to 2nd floor, gets low to floor,
• Kai challenges in English, they respond “who the fuck are you”.
• We’re friends of the owners. WTFAU?
• They shout what? No English, Hunter translates. Shimazu gets to 2, changes mind, down to Ground.
• Kai tells them there is C4 under the van, Hunter translates. Hunter sneaks forward
• General stand off, Shimazu stealths out to the van.
• Kai – we watched you, reading the paper, do you want to die. Marius translates.
• No answer. Right – if you don’t get out, in 30 seconds, I’m gonna set my ghost on you.
• Marius hears worried speech about magic. Tells Kai, sends Tads to “moose them”, Tads asks spirit to protect team, goes astral, manifests on the balcony
• Both sides lose their shit, fire, Hunter double taps one.
• Kai – “The spirit demands blood! Run, run for your life”, Marius translates
• Tads moves the “finger of death” at another one, loses his shit and falls to his knees to beg for mercy
• Marius gets a shoulder shot, takes it, 9s, 9s, down
• One comes forward to close to Tads, into Aswons LOS, head shot, dead
• Hunter shoots another, takes two shots on the armour, executes the last but one. Only one left, begging for mercy
• Tads spots the person open the door on F4, hello, good evening, Your visitors?
• Will mind our own business, closes the door. Hunter secures the prisoner and collects ammo / shells
• Marius rings contact, 5 dead, whoa whoa whoa – open comm line, 5 apples bruised one in the basket, some small bullet holes. Who is downstairs? Just some guys. Sort it out with the guys downstairs
• Discussion – what to do with the bodies – get plastic sheeting and put the bodies in the van. Take prisoner upstairs – Nadia has a Molotov, Aswon – we have got to have a chat! Take prisoner and put somewhere safe, hogtied. Get buckets and start to wash down the area. Tads steralize the area. Nadia gets a knife after Aswon takes her Molotov
• Kai and Shimazu go to talk with F4 – guy is ok, does not know what is going on. Watching cop show, didn’t hear or see anything. Never see us again. Shimazu realises quite happy
• Tads spies through floor, spotted by watcher, mage waves her away, she spots the TP guy.
• Go to interrogate the captive
• I am Emete, my boss said we were going to steal from the people downstairs, please don’t feed me to your ghost. Mazhar, the boss, the ghost point the finger at him. Overheard in the coffee shop, faulty hush field, 100s of K of stuff, Mazhar told us what to do. Kai suggest that he take over Mazhars business,
• Don’t look behind you, the ghost is back, guy shits himself (litteraly)
• Aswon baking cookies – badly (2), Nadia has emulsified the oil, Aswon does demo roll to find other compromised food
• Continue interrogation, hotches forward to kiss feet, no ghost, more poop. We’ll know everything about in in 24 hours, “the goat porn was not mine, someone used my account”
• Discussion – how to get rid of the bodies, throw the bodies into the river overnight, give the van to the captive. Aswon gets some kip, in prep for later.
• Tads suggest levitating the bodies to the middle of the straight.
• Kai goes to downstairs explains about the show he has watched, get the card, babbles at his friend. Exchanges cards, Kai spots his taster.
• Get the prisoner clean, he babbles at Aswon in Turkish, rest of the night passes without incidents
• Morning of the 13th – put guy in his van and send him away, he thanks them for their wisdom.
• Off to the ID manufacturer, final checks, done by 11am
• Tads to the garage, dropped off, gets watcher for 3 hours to go with the truck. Marius calls Ohmar, um, ah, oh. Come appropriately dressed.
• Lionheart in full display, lots of unhappy people on the streets.

I had the team on the 4th floor as an npc smuggler group - if the players had pushed a bit harder, they would have opened up, and become a potentially valuable conduit into some air smuggling circles - but they seemed content to leave them be. So, for the moment, these guys go on the back burner:
Mustafa Basem – Captain / Pilot, B3 S3, Q5, I6,W6,C5, Dark swarthy appearance, pearly white teeth, almost luminous green eyes (natural), hawk like vision, very perceptive. Pistol with gel rounds (8M, 8 rounds), rigger deck – SK Industries Dominator, R6, BF4, Flux 2, IVIS, 60MP, PEM4, Enc 6, Dec 4, Amp 2
Farida Said – Engineer, B4, S5, Q4, I5,W4, C3, Also dark and swarthy, number of scars across face (acne) , strong mechanical skills and good with mechanics / electronics B/R
Hakim Toth – EW and mage, B3, S2, Q3, I6, W6, C5. Quickened spells for Stealth (5), Vehicle Mask (5) and Absorb RADAR (2). G2 hermetic mage focussed on quickening, also with Translate (2), Mass Blindness (5),
Business card – holographic electronic, zephyr
The Zephyr
Heavily modified tilt wing kitted out for amphib operations, with a loading bay holding a number of jetskis in a drop bay. Equipped with Ruthpoly, RAMS, extended fuel tanks, partial living amenities and the jetski, there is precious little cargo space left – mostly they courier information, 1-2 passengers or small high value cargo like software, bonds, stocks, gems etc.
I had in my head the idea that they would skim the border at low level, often following the course of a river or lake, and use that to land in, and use the jetskis to get to shore for deliveries. Using the polymers and concealment to hide themselves on the water.

This week coming up, they're going to take delivery of the weapons, and then get mobbed by an angry crowd of Muslims - protesting at the heavy handed security response from the private corp-sec teams, following an atrocity committed by christian fundamentalists, just to try and flip the coin onto another side, and see how they react to that....

Session 70 writeup is now live, and can be found at: https://www.facebook.com/notes/kren-cooper/..._location=group

Difficult to get this one done in time as I was away in Ireland for the weekend visiting my dad for his wedding anniversary. But, just about managed to get it done - with a few hours to spare. Turned out a little longer than normal as well, surprisingly, as the session was a little shorter.

I had a reasonable idea for what I wanted to do, which boiled down to a 6 bullet point plan for the evening:

• Gun collection, at the restaurant Christian fundamentalists, sneak attack on the area,
• Can’t park near the restaurant – area is chock full of cars, and large number of people
• Car bomb, collapses building ahead, spikes their vehicle then gunfire behind
• Lionheart drones overhead to observe – thrown at by both sides
• Fundies doing autofire attacks on funeral parade – crushing crowd
• Imam saves them from gunfight as the locals retaliate before Lionheart arrive

I just wanted to turn things on their heads a little, and have a bunch of militant western crazies visiting violence, oppression and religious intolerance on the Muslims, and see how the team handled it. Not saying that this doesn't happen of course - but that the Western media probably doesn't report it and that we don't see it as a rule.

Tonight's session - get their guns, get back to the house, work out how they are going to pay for their bombed out car and collect their truck, and then get the magical golem that has been stolen and start to transport it to the east....

As usual, here are the in-session notes that generated the writeup, so you can see what actually happened before the fleshing out / dramatisation...

1. Into the area, try to pick up lionheart freqs, Marius decrypts – one success, gets a bit of info that things are “ok”, then frequencies shift.
2. Tries to get into his loading dock, but it’s blocked by a car
3. Call him, engaged, put on callback
4. Look for somewhere to park, about 4 streets down, marius handling check to park – ok, Roll init
5. Truck explodes, front end breaks, windscreen shatters, everyone soaks damage except Nadia – takes a light
6. Aswon calls sophie and advises – oh shit, sophie advises to sit tight, will try to get someone to them, but otherwise make sure you’re not a threat.
7. Locals get out to start digging through debris and rescue people – team set up a first aid station to help, not getting in the middle. Kai starts with Nadia.
8. Into combat time – Shimazu does not spot the fundies, Marius hears autofire from down the road, Hunter climbs on roof, Aswon moves to cover – neither spot anything, Aswon stealth 20.
9. Kai spots whites, ak, single aimed shots at the diggers
10. Aswon calls sophie back, advises white militia, turns to other direction
11. Kai throws a smoke grenade down the road at the ID militia
12. Aswon shouts people to go down the side street, 3 on Turkish, Marius assists
13. One of the fundies spots Nadia, she takes an L, drops to the ground
14. Marius loses his shit, double tap – kills one fundie.
15. Hunter spots, double tap, L+M. They run to cover
16. Sophie! I need permission to engage! I can’t do that – but do what you gotta do.
17. Incendiaries thrown – one lands near nadia, aswon sprints to get, willy pete goes off, Nadia and Aswon takes L,
18. Hunter, Shimazu and Marius charge forwards to engage – dodge tests, Hunter gets 2 – soaks 6L, others get 4 ok.
19. Hunter shoots – does M+M, Marius does M+L, , Shimazu does an M in melee, follows up with a head split. Hunter gets shot for a 10S, takes a L.
20. Aswon tries to tip Nadia over to let willy pete fall off, scraping the skin away
21. Kai runs to Nadia, assesses, realises they need to wait for stop burning, novacaine, waits
22. Hunter shoots – F1 takes an L, then M – down. Marius, shots, F3 takes an S, down. Marius swaps to ex-ex and detects some vehicle noise. Can’t spot anything – neither can Shimazu
23.  
24. Civies coming out of house, aswon spots, gun in the air – most hold fire, two shoot, do 7L+7M
25. Aswon takes a final L from the wP, drops his gun.
26. Cleric runs to Aswon, aswon tries to warn to get inside – lionheart is coming. 2, rerolls to a 1 – botch, spends a karma to turn it back to a 2
27. Hunter scoops up Aswons rifle – gets shot 4 times for his troubles, then runs after the cleric. Shimazu gets Aswon’s feet. Kai commanding voice the crowd “stop shooting”, passes Turkish roll.
28. Drone does strafing run along the street, they all get into the mosque, do triage
29. Imam asks them to put shoes and guns by the door, they say ok.
30. Drones continuing to strafe the street
31. Imam fetches water for everyone. Hunter says thanks, handshake. Gets clothes and pillows, refused clothes, gets niqab for nadia
32. Marius calls restaurant – we’re gonna be late.
33. Get hunter, old man is reading in the corner, Imam Tulur
34. Building is warded – Tads spots the general scene, Shimazu finds out that the ward must be keyed on the door. Goes to ask Marius to get the door open, the team talk him out of it
35. Local slams into front door, kai opens, beckons him in with gun – panic, shoots twice, misses twice, commanding voice, get him in the antechamber turns gun on Hunter
36. Imam comes and defuses situation, takes child inside. Explains the situation – Aswon botches translate, gets the bad version, but marius gets the good version
37. Tells story of the brain tumour boy, and the east vs west fights, decries both
38. More locals turn up – conflicted, then more – all the confusion.
39. Aswon says he can get the team out via Lionheart – but not with the guns. Marius suggests buying a local car.
40. Prayers start – uses team as an example of welcoming enemies into your homes / hearts.

Another week, another writeup - found here

This week was mostly recovering from the car bomb that hit them the week before - getting their guns, getting back to the safer west bank, and then dealing with a few curveballs. Hopefully nice and close to the end of their stay now - they have their truck repaired, upgraded and their shiny new Rating 5 IDs for everyone in the team, and they're down to less than 50K of team funds. Time to go and do some work!

Here's the notes...

• Aswon centres for modifiers – counters 1.
• Marius calls restaurant, advises that transport is totalled, retold story.
• What about usual transport – the truck would attract lionheart, you need alternate transport
• What about the scrote from the other night?
• Ask the imam, get the three – fail tests, go for option A, pay 500 in cash. Go to van, discover it’s a bit of a lemon. Marius drives – handling 5, +1 unfamiliar – gets 2 6s. Get to restaurant. Get all the toys, pay the remaining 30k
• Aswon calls Sophie to find a safe passage, oh shit – I’m on patrol. What are you in.
• Approach bridge, get stopped by Lionheart, out of the vehicle –Aswon out.
• ID check ok, don’t want to tell you your job – steal a better vehicle.
• Find out the van belongs to a slaver – give the exact location of the vehicle pickup.
• Back on the road and over the bridge. Shimazu checks background count – 7 successes, bleugh
• Back to the house ok. Perception tests – spot the guy looking out of the window. Shouted in the atrium, pop up for 2 mins
• Get all the gear up and back in the house, go see the downstairs guys, get the apb warning about the tads and hunter crossroads incident. Call Tads, advise her to cover up – stays at the garage.
• Biotech (extended care) Shimazu on Aswon, get a 6, helps with healing.
• Put the slaver van round the back of the house out of sight
• Milo turns up at 6:30 gets comfy and turns on the trid
• Rating 5 IDs, 25k each – (Aswon, Marius, Nadia, Tads, Shimazu, Hunter, Kai) – 7 = 175k
• Get IDs and legends, all ok.
• What are we getting paid – 65k+2 foci. Tads should be awesome says kai. Aswon defends her “study break”.
• Overnight the shitty van has been broken into and is stolen. Marius – the van’s been pinched. Aswon “hurrah”. No, you don’t understand, if they get nicked and blab, it will lead us back here.
• Kai calls the scrote – you’ve been good, you’ve been watched, but you’re doing ok. We have one last thing you need to do. Oh, so you need a taxi. 20 mins? See you in 15 mins
• Prioritise the illegal shit for the first run to the truck. Kai calls the garage, rolls a 1 on his Turkish, panics, hangs up. Hunter calls. Is Sasha in – no, not till lunchtime, ok, will call back later.
• Kai calls Tads – is there room to put guns in the trailer. Look, we’ve got a really long boring story, but we need to store the guns there for a bit.
• Hunter and Kai go first with the guns, Marius and Aswon, drones 2nd, Shimazu and Nadia on last trip with personal gear. Kai says goodbye to downstairs – warns of van theft, we didn’t see / hear anything
• Marius called from tiblisi, checking everything ok for tomorrow, gets the other team prepped.
• Marius calls Andre – got anything you need moving east? Not anything bulky – moving to TCL, then no plans.
• Aswon calls sophie – updates, how is the east bank, still crazy. How long is your tour – couple of months still, probably still in TCL. Shares contact details.
• Sasha arrives, nadia in the truck and doesn’t see her. Talk to Kai to get her to talk to Sasha – lost vehicle, up front tells her – very matter of fact. Tell her they’re staying in the van. Sasha says she’s not looking, not staying.
• Is Marius around – I can show him what the work looks like. Hunter calls to warn Marius. Sasha enters truck, Nadia looks at her, him, her. Sasha describes the work, bit of a tiff between Sasha and Nadia. Marius tries to keep it professional, sasha does a put down on nadia, but bounces
• Sasha advises hunter to keep one eye open when he sleeps.

Session 72 writeup - now up at this location.

In which, we finish the two week break in Constantinople, get the truck repaired and upgraded and get some shiny new guns on the black market, pick up their stolen golem and start to transport it back east.

I'm still working out quite what I'm going to throw at them response wise - it might be a Jewish spec.ops team with divining to get them into the right place, it might be random encounters, or I might see if I can really mess with their heads, and have nothing happen at all, all the way to the hand in, and see how high I can ramp the paranoia.

Suggestions welcome! Especially anyone with any knowledge of Jewish magic / golems...

Anyway, here's the notes on what actually happened, rather than the story dialogue:

• Midday on the 14th, Sasha walks back to the office. Nadia arms crossed, angry we can talk now or later, Kai pushes in and tries to defuse. Good Cha test, Nadia goes off to do other stuff. Aswon and Hunter go practice throwing, Tads finishes her learning. Shimazu goes to buy waterproof boxes via taxi, with Kai to help with translation – they have to call Hunter for one piece of translation but shopping ok.
• Nagging Kai to do something with the shares – not happening, we’re doing the golem run.
• Aswon’s gun in a chicken wire cage
• Check overnight to spot leech – nothing (though Hunter close). Shimazu feels lethargic in the morning, very grumpy.
• Morning of the 15th Kai goes shopping, gets 3 X extendable batons for 200 each (poor quality). Nadia kept busy downloading pvp patterns. Electronics all upgraded. All done by lunchtime
• Try first smart pattern, set off just after lunchtime
• Call contact, get updated co-ords, the stadium, 9pm. Start planning exit route.
• Plan to go to near stadium, eat and browse in a mall, then get to stadium
• Nadia pipes up – should get overalls from the telecom company – go buy coveralls and then customise by hand – logo printed in the mall at the t-shirt for a small bribe
• Shimazu does a biotech – detects that he’s slightly anaemic. Astrally fine.
• Shimazu checks out the leeches – told all 3 jars are empty, leeches look hungry. Shimazu gets some steak for him and the leeches, and some iron tablets.
• Plan to arrive at the stadium by 20:30, lone guard with flashlight, “server down, here to fix it”, let in through barrier.
• In under the stand, in the shadow, cameras point out around the area,
• Aswon up on the gantry with Purdey and shotgun then astral look – weird mix of feelings. Shimazu feed the leeches,
• Truck upgrades: Fake licences – 10k, PVP 20k for truck and trailer, 15k for smart materials for shape changes on the truck+5k labour. Will take 7 days of work on the truck and 4 days prep.
• Is there a northern bridge than the bombed one – no. Shimazu, what about ferry – others don’t like trapped. Hunter does a search for the pattern for stadium to feed into the pvps.
• To contact – is this a hot extract? Response, cold to warm.
• Discussions about astral security – where do we put the golem and the shaman – limits of projecting whilst moving, leaving body near golem, lack of healing into the front. Time and route planning – 1300km direct, probably about 15-1600
• Marius gets code from contact – 4173. Bulldog arrives, calls out
• All three get out, get description - hearing based perception. Hear the gun cooling
• Transfer the golem over. Nadia bug scans (badly)
• Both teams pull out – Hunter told to check comms / freqs.
• Shimazu starts F1 masking ward on the boxes – 7 weeks, soaked. Tads assenses – BGC of 3, positive – reverence / temple / history.
• Tads briefs the rest. Don’t have the door open too long. Put the parts together – no wait. Put them FAR apart.
• Vehicle stealth 11. Head for bridge get to main junction, then crawl, Listen on radio for “golem” in Turkish
• Hunter and Kai make perception tests – Nadia safety off, spotted by Hunter, basic safety lecture
• Takes an hour or so to get over the bridge, BGC2 at the blast site, cones with sandbags on the two lanes
• Cross over into the east bank – tracking gets 4 1’s no successes – no sign
• Drive past truck stop 76 – sticking to trucks top speed – 100kph
• First random – nothing
• Second random – hit, good – truck behind full beams – marius zooms in on logo – it’s the courier company.
• Aswon asks Tad to get Spirit to accident – it goes, fails test vs OR, does not come back. Truck continues to close, about 30m behind.
• Tads summons a F5, worried about the golem – 3 successes. Spirit goes and Fears the truck driver, to middle of road, then edge, off road, then tips. Spirits stays for 10 rounds continuing fear#

Session 73 writeup, now online at https://www.facebook.com/notes/kren-cooper/...56542235878964/

This week the team were mostly escaping from Constantinople with the Golem - tense moments crossing the bridge behind them, they were on the open road, making preparations and trying to get as far East as they could, as quickly as they could. It was all going suspiciously smoothly - until they met a lone figure on the road.

Oh - and another one of the team got nommed on by one of the leeches which has escaped after a careless garage worker smashed a jar and then hid the evidence. So far nobody has noticed the leech clinging to the bottom of one of the bunks, emerging at night to gorge itself on their blood and sap their will to live. They're starting to get suspicious though.

They did ask if the leeches were safe in the jar, so I gave them the count of leeches and jars they could see - obviously none of them have either remembered how many they had, or have gone back to the notes to check.... *shrug*

Anyway- as usual, here's the notes on what happened:

• 21:30pm – driving out of the east side of Korfez, 75km from Constantinople, heading down highway, truck had accident behind them
• Change truck signature as they enter the tunnel
• Tads – check for tracking – feeling of dread, magic background check – feels like tracking – she puts all sorcery and spell pool on spell defence, puts shielding up as well
• Tracking roll failed due to lodge, Tads asking the F5 city spirit to conceal the trailer as well
• Taking the coast road back the way they came and heading for Georgia
• Team talking about tracking and what to do, and who it might be, what are the options.
• First random roll – no encounter, get to midnight, feeling of dread fades
• Shimazu has finished the basic F1 ward on each ward. He puts an inside out masking ward on each box
• Second period – random encounter rolled, negative. Kai and Hunter both make perception checks to spot leech, neither good – picks Hunter.
• Second set of 6 hours, otherwise uneventful. Aswon talks to Nadia and talks about demo, and doing things safely.
• Heading up the D605, perception check – Aswon spots figure, Marius spots the contraflow, alarm raised
• Tads goes OOB and checks, spots G4, not masking, he tells them to stop and talk, sends Tads back to tell team.
• Kai – if anything happens, drive off without me. Kai gets out, with aswon and spear, Hunter ready to be a turret, Tads comes out astrally. Initally not threatening
• I want my stuff
• We have a lot of stuff, can you be more specific
• Explains stuff, polite
• I see your problem, you sounds like a businessman. How about you do a deal. We get to deliver the package. You keep tabs on it.
• Time is a precious resource.
• Offers 50k, to finish this hear and now
• Tads assenses, don’t recognise any of the abilities compared to Shimazu, tells Aswon, he broadcasts
• Can I call you? No. This is the chance to end this without trouble. I was with you until trouble, heads back to the truck.
• Goldstein moves to side of road and reads book. Aswon backs off, then bows to Goldstein, then gets back in. Truck starts moving.
• Aswon recognised Sixth sense and enhanced perceptions, not the others. Aswon perceives all the time
• Tads summons a watcher – F4, 3 successes, gets Mel Brooks, asks it to look for tracking devices.
• Kai calls, rings and rings, sleepy voice, who is it, describes encounter, they offered 50k, why not kill him, we think he would have bounced it.
• We’re coming in hot – it’s your problem from that point on. Hey, I’m not dying for this box – contact disconnects.
• Discussin in team – we knew it was hot, risk is par tof the job, hey combat monkey – Aswon.
• Kai possible plan – get 5 couriers to take bits in different directions, keep one as insurance with the charges
• Replay the conversation with Goldstein for clues
• Aswon proposes new route – Marius – do we want speed, or change route. If we move away from people, they can use heavier firepower and nobody will know.
• Tads – can they report our truck as stolen and get the local police to arrest us? Yep, nothing would stop them.
• Hunter feeling fatigued – Kai does a check, confirms that just like Shimazu he is anaemic
• Nadia follows Aswon directions and makes demo charges – she now has the safety on her SMG, having purchased SMG 1.
• Next roll – 5 nothing,
• Everyones karma pool refreshes – the team all say “oh, no….” and sound worried.
• Marius asks Nadia for coffee, Nadia looks to Kai as he’s the “coffee bitch”
• False dawn, thick sea mist, Tads summons F4 city spirit, 2 successes, drains a F7 city spirit – takes an M, cries of alarm, Shimazu assesses ok, then Tads tries to heal. Gets all boxes removed with 1 reroll
• Gets to 8am, dawn comes, mist gets thicker and then becomes a drive through miserable drizzle, low visibility, some traffic, have to slow for weather and cars
• Continue along the coast road – got to just east of samsun, near the Kurdish zone

As ever, suggestions and feedback is most welcome - in fact is actively encouraged!

Latest episode now up https://www.facebook.com/notes/kren-cooper/...56578027203964/

So - they got hit with a small advance party.
Abraham, a Grade 4 physical adept - down with deadly damage and bleeding out, stole his magic dagger.
Tobias - Ork Samurai with assault rifle firing APDS rounds - didn't get time to raid his body.
Joshua - the driver of the van, down with a serious wound after Aswon shot him through the windscreen blind
Benedict - mage with a serious wound from Hunter - but with a F8 heal spell, in the downed chopper.

Potentially, he can heal himself of pretty much all of the damage with a good roll, then get Abraham if he's quick, and certainly save Joshua. Tobias was a gonner though - his head evaporated.

On the other hand, the team took a pretty nasty pounding - Shimazu is now healed of he serious wound, but Hunter is trashed and will be much harder to heal due to his cyberware lowering his essence. Nadia is having a meltdown - first time she's ever killed someone, or been involved in combat really. And the reclamation team are down, but certainly not out, and are now really pissed at the Smugglers.

Going to be an interesting Tuesday I think.

I'm thinking now might be a good time to have the escaped leech be spotted in the day, by having it be clamped onto Kais back due to the open wounds... what do you think?

Anyway, here are the notes. This one there was a certain amount of mild regeneration during the combat turn to make things flow a bit more cinematically (or at least that was the intent)

• Trailer unhitches, tads soaks a hit as she faceplants the side, Marius u turn
• Heads back and u ies, trires to line up truck
• Aswon and hunter hear the chopper, aswon grabs his new big gun
• Aiming to manhandle the trailer out of the hedge, Shimazu, kai and tads at back of trailer, marius and nadia at the front, aswon nearer truck, hunter nearer tractor
• Shimazu soaks first burst, 10d on the second 3, reroll none, 2nd reroll, moderate, spends 2 to take a light, fails knock down test, then crawls under trailer
• Aswon, called shot, radiator on the bulldog – 5 success 8d , soaks to an M – good hit, jet of steam
• Marius pushing trailer out and back – 3 points of push
• Joshua shoots at Kai – dodges first burst, second burst hits 9m super sabot, no soak, reroll, buy 1 to take L,
• Hunter –keeps an eye on tractor – approaching slowly – changes to apds
• Nadia pushing with Marius - +1 push dice
• Kai pulling on the trailer, +1 psuh dice, slowly moving
• Tads moves to side and pushes – 2 successes, 6 on push dice,
• Tobias shoots, 4 success on Kai, hits for 11D, gets one, buys a second takes and S and dives, Second action perception test, spots hunter
• Aswon – called shot to drivers window – hits, penetrates, no success, reroll, gets one, buys 1, takes an S
• Marius heaves – trailer back on road
• Shimazu, down into the ditch / bottom of hedge, into stealth, bad roll, reroll, 15
• Hunter – hold.
• Kai – move around the trailer, keep out of LOS
• Mage – deoxygenate n Marius, 4 successes, 1 on soak, reroll, buys 3, no damage
• Shoots Hunter – 12d hit, no dodge, gets 3, buys 1, takes an m, misses on 2nd burst
• Aswon spots the chopper, checks for weapons, warns
• Marius – gets the trailer lined up, looks, works out it was disengaged
• Shimazu sneak down to see the truck and side door
• New combat round
• Shimazu, quickstrike, charge the orc, Shimazu counters mods and +1 To target, rerolls, gets 9 , beats him by 2, gets a 9S – takes an M
• He attacks shimazu back, loses by 2, soaks 9s.
• Kai – runs to get in the truck “saddle up”
• Aswon – Shoots the truck to take it out, 11 successes, truck is S+3. Shot is now LOUD
• Mage – earth elementals to bog down the truck – Marius pouts
• Marius – fully auto into earth elemental at point blank range
• Elemental #1 takes Serious damage
• Hunter – hold.
• Abraham, vault from chopper as it passes
• Tads – banish elemental from 6 to 4,
• Nadia finishes off the other elemental – two successes
• Shimazu attacks in combat – he gets 4 and buys 4 for 8, Shimazu gets 5, 9S half impact, round up – takes an Serious, on S+1 – athletics to roll back, one success.
• Kai – gets a smoke grenade, prepares for impact?
• Mage – pulls the pin on Kais smoke grenade, kai throws past the trailer in surprise
• Aswon – shoots the ork in the back, combat shotgun – called shot head, - mushroom
• Marius – shouting at tads and running to front of truck
• Tractor still driving, others stopped, chopper is overhead
• Hunter – continued to hold
• Abraham – vaulting the hedge, distance strike – 4 success, 2 on the dodge, 6m – soaked
• Shimazu – sees Abraham, quickdraw, shoots, misses, attracts his attention
• Hunters turns and sees the mage leaning out of the chopper – 5 rounds on 8s – 1 success, buys 1, mage gets 2 on soak, takes an S.
• Round 3 – shimazu quickstrikes and charges Abraham with sword, A gets 4 success, 8 shimazu (2 karma) – He soaks to an L,
• Marius – jacked in and starting up
• Aswon – shooting at the rotor shaft, gets 2 success – no soaks, takes S damage, races for van
• Dude pulls out his punch dagger
• Hunter moving towards the truck, gets a burst, buys one, does 11D – gets one, buys another, takes and S.
• Tads continues to banish elemental, it got 1, she got 6, pop, starts to move towards truck
• Nadia shoots fully auto – buys 1 pip, gets an 11D, one on the soak – dies
• Marius starts to roll forward
• Tads jumps into the trailer and closes the door.
• Shimazu grabs the dagger then gets to the trailer, Marius accelerates hard, hunter misses the jump, Aswon waves gun out to help Hunter get in, Shimazu gets in the back
• Everyone back in the truck. Nadia has the shudders – first killing.
• Shimazu climbs into the harness in the trailer
• Kai tries to self biotech – fails
• We need to do biotech – always do biotech first – I wasn’t expecting to get shot as much. Fails biotech
• Tads defaults, gets two success – drops Shimazu to S from S+1
• Tads magically heals – 6 boxes
• Aswon comes down from the hatch, nadia is bawling her eyes out – Aswon sends Nadia to get fresh clothes to start to treat kai
• End session

The opposition stat block:
The golem recovery team
Abraham, Phys-ad, G4, Masking, Centering, Improved masking, Centering (electronics), Stats of 5, Astral perception (2), Killing hands –M (1), Improved reflexes 2 (3), Pain resistance 6 (3), Mystic armour 2 (1). Armour 4/4, punch dagger (F3 weapon focus, no reach),
Tobias, samurai, Ork, Dikote spurs, Wires 3, Cyber eyes with ultrasound/ll/fc, SL2. Stats of 5, physical 7, heavy pistol with APDS, Assault rifle with grenade launcher – IPE offensive.
Joshua, driver, Human, Reaction 4, Datajack, Chipjack, skillsofts, expert drivers, vehicle skills at 4+3, Machine pistol with Super Sabot and SL2, driving a security bulldog equivalent
Benedict – G1 mage, optical binoculars, stats of 4/6, Improved reflexes 1 (f2) on sustaining foci (silver star of david on chain), Spiritbolt 5, Mindlink 5 (sustaining foci, gold wedding ring), Heal 8, Control pack 5, Magic fingers 5, Glue strip, Transform 3, Deoxygenate 5, 6 F6 elementals, 2 earth, 2 water, 1 fire, 1 air
Hughes WK-2e Stallion with ER tanks
Handle 6, Speed 140, Accel 10, Body 4, Armour 10, Sig 1, Auto 3, Pilot 0, Sensor 2, Cargo 8, Load 300, Seats 2+2, Entry 2d+1s, Jet 1750l, 0.2kml, VTOL, Util Helicopter, SI 3, Avail 19/30 days, Cost 600,000

Session 075 is up and can be found at this location.

Was an interesting session to GM, and quite flavourful. Nadia had a bit of a meltdown, and there was some good RP from the team, working out how to keep her on the rails, along with some weird twists of humour. They've finally discovered that one of the leeches was loose, and resolved that issue, and are now trying to work out how to get away from the Golem recovery squad.

A moment of levity for me at the end of the night when one of the players said "So, we just need to deal with the Jewish problem, then we're ok." He stopped, looked at me then said "And that's why we can't ever live stream this - without context, that sounds very different to how it's meant!"

So, here are the notes for this weeks run, to compare against the narrative. I say that - I'm not sure anyone's actually reading or interested, but hey, I started this, so I should see it through!

• Hunter standing in turret ring looking back to check on crash site
• Kai calls for Nadia to help, she ignores him. Commanding voice – look at me. Empathic reading – what state is she in. Traumatised by the recent activities. Kai tells her to do some basic tasks, she responds, and does as told as long as it’s basic.
• Discussion – let’s get everything in the front said Tads. Stops them separating the vehicle again, and keeps us together. Aswon detects AOD tracker on the roof, climbs out the top. Gecko crawl, spots the Frisbee, and the spirit. Calls it in, tads comes up, spirit was undecided due to AoD nature. Aswon peels and throws into passing vehicle, flicks onto a passing farm vehicle
• Discussion about how trailer got unhitched – multiple options – binos with magic fingers, spirits,
• Stopping at gas station in Carsamba east side, after about 20 mins, Marius aiming to stock up on n-R-G drinks
• Kai tries commanding voice, then Tads does stunball, puts shielding on Kai, does stunball at F2, DL=L, it takes an S, Kai takes an L, soaks, casts again, Kai soaks, Leech drops. Shimazu puts the leeches in the jar, spots that one of the jars is different. Shimazu treats Kai, has to have another go, gets a success, drops to M, then Tads does magical healing, fully heals Kai.
• Kai and Shimazu do first aid on Hunter, drops him to a Moderate. Tads –how much is your essence… oh. TN=10s, one success – drops to 2 boxes, he should heal naturally in a day or so.
• Tads and Shimazu spot the leech on Kai’s back, examine it, determine it’s definitely magic. Much wondering what is going on, Shimazu tries to get it off, with salt, goes into frenzy, emergency washes off the salt, Takes Kai up to Serious wound. Aswon tries alcohol, does not appear to have an effect,
• Much confusion about the leeches, they are put into the lodge in the back, golem into the truck,
• Strip searches on the team for leeches – Marius raised eyebrow
• Julius calls Hunter – asks for intel, agrees – when it comes through, he just wants info. Lots of info about Constantinople, warlord in Georgia, attack on the powerplant, steel mill and bribery, nature reserve and sensor net, the good imam, mafia guy in the graveyard, human trafficking, courier company is “incriminated”, doesn’t tell anything about the team to incriminate themselves, link between Constantinople mafia and Mr Kukalov, Sashas’ garage is a good spot, police response times and levels.
• Nadia still looking ropey – Shimazu double 6 on psychology. Aswon asks for help making cookies. She goes into the back, sulks a bit. Kai checks the cupboards, finds out a space where one of the jars was. No sign of broken glass. Aswon witters about stuff until Nadia reacts. “Oh my god you’re talking about cookies and I shot someone in the head”. Pep talk from Aswon, us or them, you’re not a bad person. Aswon gives honest answer to questions. This is why we want a base, to leave you in charge of. “How many people has Marius killed?” “you could argue that it was the car that killed them” Shimazu +1 Karma
• Hunter – hand on shoulder “it doesn’t get any easier, but you do get to live with it, and if you need to talk, just ask”
• Tads spots the chopper following from high and far behind
• About 800km to go. Shimazu evaluates armour – pretty badly trashed. Chopper heads out to sea and paces the team from almost LOS out at sea as they head along the coast road
• Good look at the chopper – it is the same one. Heading for the peninsula – options to stop and try to ambush them, or go for concealment.
• Go for the concealment position, change the signature, PVPs, spirit to conceal,
• Tads create food – onions – just by the jet turbine inlet.
• Glue strip on the windscreen, control pack – birds into the glue, just as they enter concealment

What I also did was work out how badly injured the recovery team was, and how they had to fix themselves up - mechanics were:

1. Off camera
2. Chopper landed, Ari (pilot) slotted first aid, did first aid on Abraham (phys-ad) stabilise on D. First aid on Benedict (mage), got successes, drop him to moderate. First aid on Joshua (ground driver), one success, drops him to Moderate.
3. Benedict (mage) casts heal on self (6s with reroll), gets 2, buys 1 to get to no damage. Heal on Joshua (8s) 1+1 from reroll, drop him to Light. Heal on Abraham on 4s, 8 successes+2 into time, drop him to a light
4. Abraham: Light wound (2 boxes), weapon foci stolen, 2 rerolls remaining
5. Tobias: Dead
6. Joshua: Light wound (2 boxes), 3 rerolls
7. Benedict: Unwounded, 5 rerolls
8. Ari: Unwounded, 5 rerolls
9. Bulldog: Destroyed
10. Hughes: Serious damage (6 boxes)

My plan for the night mostly went through - just the last encounter to do once they've got rid of the chopper. Or maybe through both in together. Hmm, decisions, decisions.

Hi everyone! Well, xmas is out of the way, and we're due our first session of 2019 tonight - so I spent the weekend and yesterday getting the writeup done to make sure everyone could remember where we got to after the break. As usual, the writeup for episode 76 is on facebook at this location.

There was a little artistic licence taken with the running order of events in the narrative compared to the session - but nothing that materially changed the flow of events or the outcomes.

Here's the notes made during the session:

• Tads – sense of incoming danger, same vague feeling for Aswon and Shimazu
• Into the tunnel, change colour and shape. What about a trid phantasm to change the shape – the mage will see through it.
• Stop in the tunnel, start to clean the truck,
• Discussions – tads, get in the trailer, magic background check, n+1 discussion, can’t spot the magical threat anymore
• Do we wait in the tunnel, do we turn back, can we change lane (no),
• Once windscreen is clear, make a U turn - Marius tries (re-roll, spend 1 karma), 1 success – 15 point turn
• Can we make another vehicle look like us, magical signature – they will get my sig, but hey,
• HONK HONK
• Get out of the way, let traffic past, spot for a good target for vehicle mask
• Hunter plot route back and round the interior – about 200km extra
• Vehicle mask – 8 successes, F7 on 2nd big truck going past,
• Kai plan – stop in the tunnel and wait them out – make them think they’ve missed us, they should follow the other truck
• Much frothing
• Second vehicle mask on another truck, after 2-3 minutes
• Backlog of traffic cleared, first traffic heading east now coming
• Truck under concealmeant, now joins traffic heading west, to leave the tunnel F7 spirit. Out and turn
• Team do not get spotted doing the turn and re-entering the tunnel
• Come out of the tunnel, check for follows – nothing
• Got to ordu, check again, nothing, drop concealment
• Another 45 mins/km to giresun, tads drops the spells, starts to rest
• Another 60km to near Aralikoz, now about 2pm. Leave Gorele. Program in new colour change and smart materials – slow, gradual changes
• Shimazu and Aswon don’t spot ambush – watching the colour change, hunter set on automatic,
• Rest spot the road block, 1.25km ahead. Work out what IDs to use – going with Dr / Professor / Nurse ones
• Kai – where is the next near hospital past roadblock – Trabzon, 120km
• Roll up to the roadblock
• One per door, bang again, angry, snigger when checking Hunters, ask for bribe, Kai offers 200, good charisma check
• Pull round past the checkpoint, head over again, hit Trabzon around 3pm out the other side
• Continue another hour to the border checkpoint, no encounters, arrive 4pm
• Nadia has to rescan, all ok, 200ny bribe
• Shimazu take over driving, get to Batumi for about 6pm
• Leaving via the southern road, an hour along, police car flashes the blues, Kai tries, Georgian only, gets Hunter,
• Your truck has no winter permit, how much 450, comes back with 350 in a jar, adds vodka, sniff, is good
• Arrive into Khulo about 7:30
• Shimazu 4 success on 5s on mountain roads – getting the feel of the truck, pull 2gs
• 2 hours from Tbilisi, call Georgi Koralov, get through all ok, arrange to meet at the reservoir
• Pull over, swap to Marius for driving, Tads summons mountain spirit, F4 – 3 successes
• Uneventful journey into Tbilisi, get to reservoir about 9:30
• Get to Georgi – 10pm, roll for initative, end session

In the session tonight we should be having a nice little fight as the Jewish hit squad try to reclaim the golem in a last ditch attempt before they pass it on to Georgi and his crime syndicate. After this, i'm hoping the team will head back to town and set up their base and establish Nadia there, to give them a home location - I'm not holding my breath though.

...wow, nice to see someone still GMing a 3e campaign some 14 years after it was replaced by 4e. Looks like it has been a lot of fun.

Been involved with Shadowrun since 1e, and 3e is by far still my favourite edition.

I last GM'd a 3e campaign back around 2010- 2011 (my Shadows of Europe based arc, I still have the entire write-up for it).

Yeah, where I am everyone is pretty much into 5e these days. Been doing the Missions thing just to sort of stay "in touch" but it is definitely not the same (I miss my million nuyen Decker and Rigger along with the counterattack action for my Adept, and dislike "luck" attributes [Edge]).

There was so much intrigue and so many plot threads/hooks one could run with in 3e, many of which were poorly wrapped up or simply "snipped" after System Failure.

Carry on.

And another session put to bed - Episode 77 "Hovercraft Assault" can be found here

This week, the players had just reached the handover point to get rid of their cargo when the enemy assault team made one final effort to reclaim their goods, a waterborne assault using 4 hovercraft. To mix things up a bit, I started the combat off at a range of nearly 500m, so that meant that most of the players were out of range for their weapons, and it gave a bit of thinking time. Of course, the bad guys were shooting at them with cannon, which where definitely IN range...

As usual, here are the points from the writeup - mostly faithful there was a tiny bit of rearrangement for narrative flow, but nothing major. A bit shorter than normal, this one is only 4.7k words - but we also only had a 12 second fight that lasted most of the session - ahh, Shadowrun, don't ever change...

• In the car park, on the edge of the road, explosion hits the gate post, about RPG size,
• Marius readies dalmation, Aswon with purdey, perception check with thermos on 6s, spots vague shapes on the water, about 500m out.
• Benedict mage spots Aswon, magic fingers, poke in the eye, soaked, Aswon puts on smart goggles
• Hunter goes back to van and getting his better AR.
• Ari targets Georgi with MMG, 1 success, georgi dodges+buys 1, rolls under van.
• Kai checks the other way for ambush / distractions, - looks quiet, nothing spotted (good rolls)
• Tads stunball on the med hovercraft (16m radius), casting at S, soaks – does S stun to Ab, Jo and Ari, nothing on Benedict
• Light hovercrafts fire canons and take out georgis car
• Marius – sensor check 5 successes but too far away for details yet
• Aswon, called shot light vehicle, headshot 1 success – 11D, target gets one soak, buys one, passes crash test, but pulls off – fails prof rating
• Shimazu hides behinds georgis vehicle
• Hunter grab other gun and get outs of hatch, starts to aim, finger laser range finder
• Marius jumps into drone as it launches, armed with twin compd ARs
• Marius accelerates (3 successes, 24m/t), vehicle stealth 5
• Aswon next target – called shot, aimed shot, gets one, buys 1, takes S, breaks off
• Hunter – still out of max GL range at 300, continue to aim – bigger target
• Shimazu – spots mage in the big hovercraft
• Medium boat fires MMG at Shimazu, two misses by 1 pip.
• Last light target misses the truck with cannon
• Marius drone, just inside extreme range with drone of light target, reg ammo, does S+M, starts to bug out
• Aswon shoots the gunner on the medium – Ari takes an S after 2 rerolls.
• Hunter fires GL, aiming at the driving well, 2, reroll, 4, driver and co-driver both take S, Benedict takes an S too,
• Tads hides, Kai shouts at georgi to get in truck, Aswon perception test, spots elementals, warns group, Shimazu gets sword ready, Hunter reloads
• Spirits appear and attack – water on hunter and kai, earth on tads and georgi
• Aswon – run to truck, to get spear
• Shimazu engages earth on Tads, beats, chops legs off, Marius shoots at med hovercraft does L+L, Hunter attacks spirit burst,+burst, does M+S
• Spirit attacks georgi, G takes a light after burning his re-roll
• Hunter psychic headbut – hits, but it soaks
• Kai double tases his elemental, kills it, Aswon gets spear, Marius swings round behind the medium hovercraft, Shimazu goes to help Georgi, does an M, Aswon gets spear and stabs the one fighting Hunter – wins by 9, kills it, leaves via side door.
• Marius called shot to hovercraft engine, 9s, reroll, misses with one, gets one hit, Aswon goes for the one on geogi – it dodges onto shimazus blade and dies, Tads finishes off her elemental
• Hunter grenade, kills the people in the hovercraft, no damage to the craft
• Georgi – huzzah, well done you killed everything, right?
• Kai – where we going. Georgi, stay here. He gets credstick
• End for the night