Please post sheets and/or links to sheets below. Please also make sure that your sheets are updated with your latest spending. I often use sheets to tailor situations to what you have.

Here's our Redmond HQ: https://stormy-waters-2075.obsidianportal.c...ervices-redmond

Here's our Bellevue home: https://stormy-waters-2075.obsidianportal.c...rvices-bellevue

And here's our calendar so far:

Chapter 1: Sunday, September 18, 2078
Chapter 2: Monday, September 26, 2078
First Interlude: Saturday, October 1, 2078
Chapter 3: Monday, October 10, 2078
Second Interlude: Sunday, October 16, 2078
Chapter 4: Sunday, November 6, 2078
Third Interlude: Wednesday, November 23, 2078
Chapter 5: Thursday, November 24, 2078
Fourth Interlude: Sunday, November 27, 2078
Chapter 6: Thursday, December 22, 2078
Fifth Interlude: Sunday, January 1, 2079
Chapter 7: Friday, January 20, 2079
Sixth Interlude: Wednesday, February 1, 2079
Chapter 8: Sunday, February 5, 2079
Seventh Interlude: Wednesday, February 8, 2079
Eighth Interlude: Tuesday, February 14, 2079
Chapter 9: Thursday, March 2, 2079
Ninth Interlude: Saturday, March 11, 2079
Chapter 10: Monday, March 20, 2079
Tenth Interlude - San Angelo: Tuesday, March 21, 2079
Tenth Interlude - Seattle: Friday, March 31, 2079
Chapter 11: Saturday, April 8, 2079

Raven's Character Sheet

Bobby's sheet is here:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/107f...wr2Q/edit#gid=0

https://stormy-waters-2075.obsidianportal.com/characters/am

I bought an R7 Comlink, a Suzuki Mirai, knucks, and a bike racing armor/helmet (for safety while riding).

We have an office in Redmond, and a home in Bellevue (we basically continue paying for the old lifestyle).

Sorry for the confusion; it's a valid question.

You're in Redmond, where a potential employer will soon appear.

The conversations with the Bellevue neighbors are more like flashbacks, a recap of conversations you've had over time since moving in.

Oh, okay. I thought the new place was also the new office, basically.

Bye
Thanee

Tamarind character sheet: https://brexbasicbackups.obsidianportal.com...acters/tamarind

I was going to have Tarmarind freak out about the police, but then I realized that she likely doesn't know who is at the door yet, since the only message that has gone out is AM's somewhat cryptic one.

Are you taking your own vehicle or are you catching a ride?

Catching a ride - no sense in burning our own gas

Yep, let's just go with them.

Bye
Thanee

P.S. Isn't parking a non-issue in Shadowrun, since cars can just drive autonomously? The autopilot could simply go find a parking place anywhere and come back, when needed.

I was thinking the same thing.

This is probably true in most of the city, but in my head there's a little asterisk that says "may not apply in Redmond".

Now Touristville is semi-functional and only semi-lawless, so it's open to interpretation how well Gridlink works. I tend to think "some days yes, some days no". But, in the end, how much you trust the dogbrain autopilot of your vehicle in such an environment is up to you.

That's just my take. Other interpretations are valid too.

That's fair.

In Redmond (probably even more so in Puyallup) you might want to keep an eye on where you park.

Bye
Thanee

My assumption is that there are no shortages of places to park in Redmond .... just that in most of them, if you don't pay off the local gang (or whoever) you can't count on your vehicle being intact if you are out of sight for any length of time. Presumably could tell the dog brain to just keep driving around, but also likely there are sometimes dog-traps to lure vehicles into salvage operations (sure all the parts are marked ... but they can quickly be in matrix-dead parts of Redmond where they are, re-processed for safe resale.

Right, I was thinking along the same lines. A dogbrain would be easy to trap and corral.

Operatives like yourselves would have the know-how and capability to track down a "borrowed" vehicle and (forcibly) retrieve it, but that's a hassle and you're pissing off the local gang by doing so.

Regular civilians slumming it in Touristville would be subject to the whims of K-E, who might be inspired to act if appropriately incentivized.

@Gilga I like that negotiating ploy about if Potter is elected.

It is clever.

@Beta,Tecumesh I am happy you think that. Spent a while thinking about the situation because I knew AM would haggle and I wanted to do her justice.

Minor point but 'incumbent' is the current holder of an office. If Brackhaven were still in the race, he'd be the incumbent since he was the governor. Since neither Ms. Taul or Ms. Potter are the current governor, they're just candidates (not the incumbent).

And I've been spelling it 'encumbent' up until now so I've been doing it wrong all this while. ('Encumbent' is rarely used and is related to words like "encumber" or "encumbrance".) So I got to learn something new today too.

Hmm, I could imagine some groups would view politicians as encumbent, given that definition

Learnt something new today

I was under the impression that incumbent means the top candidate - which it does, but only by virtue of meaning the one already in office

To be fair, it is not exactly a term that is used a lot.

Bye
Thanee

I'll post today to move Bobby and Tamarind to the bar to meet with Lysander. (Does anyone remember if we have a description of Lysander from previous chapters?)

Are AM and Raven headed toward the University of Washington or do they have a different agenda in mind?

I guess it does not hurt to take a look around at the University to get an impression.

But to get some useful information from there, we might need to do more than that, and probably make a plan.

Bye
Thanee

Lysander is an androgynous elf, playing heavily into the non-binary appearance. Changes hair colors every time

I was thinking to head there and see if they have physical evidence, yearbook pictures and whatnot.

I cross-posted with Tecumseh - but I sort of like that post. So if you are okay with it I want to keep it.

Go ahead and keep it. The fate of the kid is largely inconsequential.

~~~

Jack, please roll Logic + Zoology for Bobby.

Zoology: 9d6t5 2

Really close to a glitch - still a success

She'll augment her intution: (buy 4 hits)
drain: 11d6t5 1
Then, take 2 stun drain - when she augments her intuition (she'll go to the toilet to be discreet about casting the spell - but the spell is visible to an astral observer.
As for computer search:
computer search: 16d6t5 5

AM's done some research.

Raven has an hour to kill before AM is done.

Are Bobby and Tamarind headed to Snohomish to check things out in person, or was Tamarind just going to send her drones to see?

Edit: A reminder that you have access to a MonaLisa subscription (from Cutting Aces).

I think they are going there in person. Might as well, given no need to bring in the others yet.

Perception for the swarm: using the R5 RCC in place of pilot, and her R6 clearsight autosoft, with 6 drones in the swarm for a +5.
drone perception: 16d6t5 2
Well, that was disappointing. Maybe there is some override going on for the usual flyways that keep them from getting a good look?

matrix perception: 13d6t5 4 Hopefully enough to get the rating of the host.

Gilga, what approach is AM taking when she reaches out to the professors? Who does she say she is and why does she want to meet?

She says that she is doing a background check on a former student of theirs. She'll be polite and follow a standard format for such a request and try to phrase it within corporate etiquette without giving too many details on who the background check is—saying that more details can be given in the meeting.

Okay. It's the weekend so it might take a while to get a response. (Having the job last a week was intended to let you enact plans that may need some time to come to fruition, like surveillance or long cons.)

It's about lunchtime. Here's where I have everyone:

AM - café, Matrix searching
Bobby - outside animal hospital
Raven - outside undergraduate library
Tamarind - on drone surveillance/overwatch

Yeah, I thought we would just collect some information about the University today, so we can make a plan on how to get access to the information we are looking for (if it is there).

No need to rush into things with little preparation.

Bye
Thanee

The problem with trying to use Watchdog (Kill Code, page 40) to get a mark is that it only works on personas and devices, she can't go directly for the host. So it may or may not be possible in this situation. The plus side is that is uses Electronic Warfare, where she has some decent skill.
She runs Encryption, Toolbox, and Sneak in her datajack+, giving +1 on the three matrix attributes that she has, giving A/S/D/F = * / 4 / 6 / 7.

Watchdog to get a mark on device: 11d6t5 1 not a good start to her hacking career, so let's edge that to re-roll fails
re-roll fails: 10d6t5 4
Total of five successes, can keep four. The device could be higher rating than the host, but likely isn't, so going to guess a rating 2 device, then roll a couple extra dice in case iti is rating 3
defense against Watchdog, R2: 4d6t5 1
in case R3: 2d6t5 1
Assuming it isn't higher than rating 3, she gets her mark, and can follow it upstream to the host.

Once she is in, she'll adjust her avatar to suit the host, and take a quick look around (if there is little activity in the host but there is someone inside then she'll need to run silent, and all results below use the value in brackets)

Then matrix search
matrix search: 9d6t5 2 successes 2 (2)
R2 host resist matrix search: 7d6t5 3
First search goes poorly, but it is a legal action so shouldn't trigger issues.

Try again
matrix search: 9d6t5 4 successes 4 (4)
R2 host resist matrix search: 7d5t5 1

I think that should find the client records. Matrix perception to check for encryption/bombs (unlikely, but might as well check)
Matrix perception on client records: 11d6t5 4 which should be enough to tell.

Assuming no encryption she browses the files for info on Potter. If it has encryption she's blocked, as she doesn't have an attack stat at the moment.

Note, you are currently describing a direct connection hack.
You'd need to have one of your drones attach a fibre optic cable to your device to get the low dice pool from the device.

I don't think we're that far off. Even with a wireless approach, the animal clinic host is only going to be rolling 8 to resist Watch Dog.

Even with extra dice, the host cannot beat Tamarind's edged roll to place a mark, so that's done.

Tamarind will need to Run Silent once inside, but that doesn't affect her roll results.

Searching is easy enough. She'll be able to find client records.

The thing with Watchdog is that it can't go straight after the host, it has to go after a persona or device. So then the question is what is required to hack a device?

I admit that I'm rusty on my hacking. My memory was that directly connecting to any device let you hack that device (and if it is attached to a host, also getting a mark on the host). I recalled discussions about icons being in the grids versus in the host, with some devices that are owned by a host being in the grid, due to needing a public interface, but that might have been a 6e discussion? I just went and skimmed through the 5e CRB hacking section, but if it says anything about this I couldn't find it. I'm inclined to go with Jack on this one, his rules memory is generally better than mine.

In which case, I'd say just ignore all of those rolls. AM will be available later and can blow through the place simply by buying hits. I just thought that I had an opportunity to use Tamarind's new toy. It will have zero game implications if none of that happens.

The animal clinic is meant to be a very soft target. In my mind, it's a good training ground for Tamarind's hacking hobby.

The host is rating 2, the Firewall rating is 4. That would make the a defending dice pool of 6 in most cases.

(Earlier I said the defending dice pool would be 8, but I was misremembering the host rating as 3 instead of 2.)

I don't see anything in Watchdog that requires a direct connection. In this case, the host rating is so low that hacking a device through a direct connection would not be much easier than hacking it wirelessly.

As I said earlier, the target was intended to be very easy, something that Tamarind could handle if she wanted to. She did, Beta did the rolls, and I wrote up what Tamarind found, so let's keep it as it is. If there's an improved understanding of the rules, we'll use it next time.

Nah, it's all good then - with the low host rating it really makes no difference.

But for future hacks against harder targets having a drone attaching a wire to a slaved device is a valid strategy for easy entrance to a host.

Hi guys,
RL seems to get my SR time. I am off for a short vacation. so if I am a bit passive feel free to nudge me, and or puppet AM if I am at the critical spot so you don't wait for a hack role for too long or whatnot.

Vacation sounds nice. When are you back?

Monday.

Enjoy your vacation, Gilga!

What's a good test for pattern recognition? Perception is generally for noticing things with physical senses.

Beta, give me a Logic + Intuition test unless someone thinks of something better.

Int+log is pretty much exactly what you need

Btw: Matrix search is not an opposed test, even inside a host

The complication there is a potential patrol IC and it's matrix perception vs your sleaze you have to deal with