Last night, I was wondering about the best way to kill all the PCs in the following hypothetical situation.

Let's say you're the GM, and you've spent all this time and inspiration thinking of a wonderful long term adventure thingie.

It starts small, has a lot of nuance, and is supposed to go on to bigger, better, and epic things. The PCs initially have to go into a Stuffer Shack and gain access to the back room so they can steal some of the manager's records.

So you're all set to begin and finish the Stuffer Shack segment in 30 minutes of game time. However, much to your horror, one of the PCs shows up at the stuffer shack with a rocket launcher, and another shows up with a HMG. In broad daylight one PC fires a rocket at the counter, killing almost everyone inside and blowing apart shelves and the other PC finishes the job by laying down suppressive HMG fire back and forth across the store until everyone is dead. Then the rest of the team walks into the back room and gets whatever they came for.

Okay, so what is the intuitive thing that would happen next? Lone Star would probably arrive, and the PCs would blow the initial forces away. However, escaping in an urban area from a police force with helicopters is very hard, and eventually there would be so many Lone Star and LS SWAT teams that the PCs would be overwhemled and killed. No matter how good or lucky the PCs are eventually the national guard would appear and pwn them. There would be virtually no way to avoid extermination for any longer than 24 hours at the most.

That is what *should* happen by all accounts, but it's very hard to actually make happen in the context of a game. The GM would get exhausted by having to roll for hundreds and hundreds of progressively tougher opponents. The playerss would get pissed off that their PCs are all doomed. And certainly, the GM wouldn't be happy about spending the evening in repetitive combat exercises with a linear goal behind them when he or she has this whole campaign waiting.

So in the end, what's supposed to happen? I can't figure out a good way to handle a situation where in effect the PCs should not be allowed to get away with something, no matter what.

Have a "good samaritan" (actually a mage who saw the crap going down and quickly threw up an invisability spell) take care of things via spirits and high-powered control action spells.

hmm. Use of a rocket-launcher and military grade machine gun. Check. Wanton destruction of property on a large scale. Check. Mass murder in the first degree. Check. Here's the question: did they remember to take out any security or traffic cameras? Not that this matters, but it would slow down the Star's response a little.
Here's another one, and it's a doozie: Are they in a Z-marked section of the city? If so, no worries, this kinda crap happens all the time. If it's anything with one or more 'A's in it, you're f**kin' screwed. A 'C' or a 'D' and you might, MIGHT be able to make it out before anyone shows up, then it's just a matter of if they were smart enough to take precautions against being recognized/tracked.

Assuming A+ rating.
Okay, that SWAT team should be therein a little under ten minutes, the air should be alive with helicopters and spirits / projecting mages scoping the situation. Roadblocks for miles in any direction, mass human evactuation, all the christmas trimmings. Those PC's are dead/arrested after a short standoff with the cops. There, it's over.

Orbital cow.

A generic Great Dragon who just happens to be addicted to Stuffer Shack cuisine just happens to be stopping by his favorite fast food franchise disguised as a human. Seeing it totally destroyed he is understandably upset. He used a force 10 control actions spell to force the rocket launcher wielding fellow to turn the weapon on his comrades. He then assums his true form and eats the surviving runners.

Its an asanine way to kill off a party, but far less asanine that blowing up a stuffer shack.

Alternatly, assuming that they don't have any AV ammo, a suped up Citymaster with some turret mounted HMGs could do the trick.

Lets see... first run, partway through, had someone lean out the window of a car in an A+ neighbourhood and shoot a security guard... face got plastered on everything, and they bolted in their car.. forget what kind it was.

Other members saw this on the news, swore blue streaks, and went to set up an ambush to get the cops off the tail of their 'friend'. Or, more accurately, their friend's passenger.

They set up the ambush. A city spirit materialized in the middle of the street with confusion going. There were 4 squad cars just outside the range of the confusion ahead of the vehicle.

This is the result of one shooting.. I would think that there would be far MORE serious responses to a rocket launcher and HMG.. such as multiple high force spirits and a couple police choppers..

NB: The ambush did work.. mostly because the runner with the AK-98 and underbarrel grenade launcher missed with the first grenade.. and the scatter (which we watched be rolled) landed dead centre of the 'Star grunts... the second got lodged in the city spirit (liquid pavement). We were blessed by luck. The shooter, well, he didn't survive.. The other Sam shot him once. The adepts shot him several times and cut out his cyberware to recoup their losses for the run, and ditching Seattle for Denver.

Lone Star SWAT Snipers airlifted via helicopter onto bulidings 100 meters or so out +Barret Sniper Rifles +APDS rounds = Total Party Kill

The problem with that is that you can be a lot further out if you have a barret and are in a chopper. The grenade launcher should have a MUCH shorter range than a 50 cal sniperifle.

If nothing else, condor drones with barrets from Lonestar. Give them Ruth poly and heat sinks, and a few will take out the team.

Another plan would be a Star combat mage with a high power area effect stun spell.

Also, if your pcs always cary that kind of heat, have lonestar take them out while they sleep. You can only go so long without going to bed.

Are they working for themselves or a Johnson/Fixer? If it's the latter then just have the fixer call them up for a face to face meet and then have him ambush them. The amount of heat they'd be drawing, and the possibility of their being arrested and talking about their employer, means he needs them dead as soon as possible.

Or do a Leon on them. They make it out and hole up in a safehouse somewhere, only to have someone rat them out to the cops for a reward. Cue the FRT/SWAT teams assaulting the building - of course they'll be quiet setting up until they're kicking down your door and throwing in the grenades.

All StufferShacks come with a self destruct mechanism. Duh...

I'll go you one better: If this is their first run, how'd they get a PAC and a GPHMPG?

Okay, a serious response. If I had a team do that out of the blue, LS would be getting multiple paniced calls about the psychos wiping out a stuffer shack with rockets and MG fire. A projecting mage will arrive on the scene seconds later and make a quick assessment, materializing for a better look if the team has poor magical support. Observation drones will already by attempting to get onto the scene, and any LS units in the area will be advised to observe and pursue at a safe distance. A well equipped HTR team (or more than one) will be dispatched in a chopper. The first mage will return with enough magical back up to handle whatever awakened threat was intially observed, plus a little extra, attempting to neutralize the team's magical support and doing what they can to mess up the mundanes.

When the magical assault begins, the HTR team will also be attacking. If the runners are fleeing in a vehicle, then, depending on circumstances, the HTR will attempt to disable the vehicle from the chopper, or deploy ahead. They will have been issued AV and APDS rounds, and potentially have extra heavy weapons as well (if the runners' vehicle is particularly heavy duty). If the runners follow a predictable route, and the original HTR teams are not succeeding, then the heavily armed Citymaster will be deployed.

Once the team's magical support is taken down, the projecting mages will attempt to enter the vehicle, and start having elementals and spirits manifest and take out the survivors.

I know you don't want to roll a lot of dice, but I suggest you do exactly that. Your wrist will hurt, but it's the best way to teach the player how to behave properly in your campaign ; by demonstrating what happens when they do something that stupid.

I'm guessing this happened in a A or C part of the town : It has a stuffer shack. AA or better wouldn't have such a crummy business while E or less wouldn't have such a business at all. B and D are industrial zones AFAIK.

So, in an A or C zone, someone is bound to have a cellphone. It isn't unreasonable to assume that someone saw the imbeciles enter the stuffer shack with heavy ordonances and called the cops. If Lonestar gets a call about heavily armed criminals carrying HMG and missile weapons, they'll wake up the FRT immediately. If the 911 operator has any doubt about the validity of the call, they'll be wiped when she hear the ruckus through the phone. So basically the FRT, the drones, the astral mage and his spirits... They all get under way as soon or even before the runners pull the trigger.

Don't feel bad hitting them with a Mage and 4 elementals before they even leave the shop. Have an air support drone on the scene ASAP. Hit them hard. Even if they get away, plaster their face all over the news and then proceed with a SWAT assault on the presumption that someone in the population tipped the cops. Ritual link on their ass with any blood that might have been spilt. Have the cops track down the weapons that were used; there can't be that many source of heavy weapon in this town. Use whatever means necessary that feel fair and logical without being cows from the space. Make sure you get at least all the worst offenders before calling off the manhunt.

You'll roll tons of dice and waste a lot of time. But I'm pretty sure the new PCs won't do something this idiotic anytime soon and that's the real payoff. Cows from the space don't really teach players anything, they just figure their GM is a jerk.

The players may think that Shadowrun is a game of combat. What they did may be what they want Shadowrun to be like. If you want to change their perspective on Shadowrun, they need education.

If these were my players, here's what I would do:
a) They get away, no problem.

b) You ask them to make backup characters, because the risk of death is so high in their type of work.

c) The old characters are hired a week later (you specify the date in game terms), by a new Johnson, to do the same type of high-powered blow-'em-up action against a corporate target (research, manufacturing, warehouse, whatever). You let them make their plans, pack their gear, head to the scene, and start firing. Suddenly you set everything aside.

d) You have them take out their backup characters, who get called for their first meet. You specify the date in game terms. It is the day after the Stuffer Shack incident. He tells the new characters about all the stupid things that the first team did, and how they are marked men, with a bounty on their head. Mr. Johnson hires the new team to locate the first team, using photos taken at the Stuffer Shack. The Johnson makes it clear how he wants the new characters to behave. (You, the GM, are educating them, after all.) Their pay is dependent upon their performance. All it takes is legwork.

e) The second team is hired to infiltrate a corporate facility. They are told that their exit from the building will be hidden by an attack by the first team. The first team is guaranteed to get caught because Lone Star will get a tip about the attack just in time to capture / kill all of the first team.

f) You run through the infiltration, and their exit from the facility, up to the point of hearing the start of the assault. They switch to their original characters to play out their capture/death.

g) You switch to the second team, where their escape is completely covered by the noise and fighting on the far side of the facility. Hurrah!

h) Mr. Johnson pays the second team for a good infiltration. Mr. Johnson collects the reward for turning in the first team. The players are educated.

I like the idea but there's a lot left to chance.

1) What happens if all of the second team don't make it?

2) What happens if all (or just some) of the first team get away?

3) What happens if the players try to get "retroactive" and say the second group would have tried to contact the first group? (I guess GM railroading is option)

4) What happens if the second team disreguards the lessons and behaves like the first team?

For 1 and 2, you could just roll the to two groups together but that's makes for some odd RP situations. I don't know if that matters or not.

You might be assuming that the players are quicker learners than they are.

For a situation like this, you just need to suck it up, find the stuff in New Seattle that applies to your situation, and let the dice fall where they may. There may be a way out for the players who didn't open up with the heavy artillery, but that probably means disassociating themselves from the other two. There may be a way out for the other two even PROVIDED they can get themselves either a) into a Z zone or b) out of Seattle and across the border. You'll have to decide if the level of surveillance makes an ID possible, or whether or not a TIPS program works afterwards but... In any case, the players brought this on themselves.

mark my words though, if you don't sack up and enforce consequences in game, you better expec this and worse from them in the future. They'll continue to see it as a viable option.

Out of curiosity, was this just completely out of the blue, unexpected violence, or do they usually go around blowing the ever loving crap out of stuff?

My simple solution, regardless of if they dodge the cops or not... PC party uses that much force to get into the back room of a Stuffer Shack, PC party finds the only work they'll ever get hired for is merc work with a near 100% fatality rate of past applicants.

I like OurTeam´s solution. What kind of roleplayers wouldn´t get the message and act accordingly? My players would immediatly realize the folly of their previous actions, and furthermore think the whole thing was cool. I´m making assumptions here, but doesn´t all experienced roleplayers understand that roleplaying is a team effort to have fun and make an illusion work? I think they would have to be either very young or very inexperienced players, to be stubborn enough to actively work against the GM when they´re not only told they are acting stupid, but are also treated to an exciting story giving them that message.

Wounded Ronin:

I realize that this might not work, given that Seattle in the 2050s/2060s probably uses what we now refer to as "alternative energy sources" (i.e., solar power and the like), but how about this?

--The rocket-launcher PC's overenthusiasm ruptures a natural gas main under the Stuffer Shack, left over from the time the Stuffer Shack was a *insert name of 20th-Century fast-food franchise here*. (Many restaurants these days, not just fast-food places--or "quick-service" restaurants, to use the politically correct term--use natural gas or LPG to power their grills and the like, because it supposedly improves the taste of certain foods.)

Perhaps the aforementioned gas system hasn't been used for ages, and almost everybody who knew about it is long dead?

The resulting gas explosion levels the building.

Another possibility would be a variation on the above scenario--one of the PC's rockets blows a hole through the concrete foundation of the Stuffer Shack, triggering a massive methane explosion when a fragment of hot metal (or anything that's burning as a result of the rocket explosion, for that matter) falls into the sewer.

Not quite as elaborate as some of the scenarios postulated by others who answered your question, but entirely possible, if the conditions I suggested are met.

--Foreigner

@ Foreigner:
While that suggestion certainly has the merit of making the players pay for their actions, it sort of smacks of GM fiat - it's another orbital bovine bombardment solution, really.

The best thing - as far as I can make out - would be a combination of two things (in no particular order):

1- talk to the players and find out why in dog's name they thought they should go about things in this particular way.

2- make it clear that the characters' actions have consequences, in both an IC and OC context. OurTeam's suggestion is a good one, I think...if you actually want to kill off these PCs.

On a general note, I personally think that you might (if you want to go down that road) be able to get a pretty rockin' story out of a group of screw-up runners trying to dig their reputations out of the dirt after a job like this one.

Given the specific circumstances, though - use of military grade hardware to commit mass-murder, property damage, causing mayhem and explosions, and killing law enforcement personnel...

It's obvious that the plot you've set up is at this point shot to hell, and if their behavior in that initial scene was any indication, it really serves no point except to irritate and waste time on the part of both you, the GM, and them, the players, to even continue the game. Don't bother killing them with SWAT (which wouldn't be that hard, sharpshooters are terrifyingly lethal in Shadowrun), just tell them that the game's over. Saves everyone time and lets you devote time you'd otherwise have to spend running the inevitably lethal police response to something constructive, like finding new players.

More importantly, I would be very specific, clear, and calm when telling them why the game is over. Then have them toss together new characters, and hire them on as a second-string team Johnson had ready to handle the job. Their first mission can be a stealthy, kill-team, raid/assassination on the old team to get the files back.

I have a few questions:

Have you rolled the various response times for Lone Star?

Are they able to stealth their way out?

Perhaps a better question is: are your players enjoying themselves? If they are, then you need to adjust the game to suit your players. If you can't, then you need to find a new group.

Well, one could explain, "Hey, guys. We can either go through the several hours of combat as H.R.T.s hunt you down and grind you into the dirt, or, we can just say you're all very, very dead and start over."

Or you could start the next game session with something like:
"Fifteen years later, standing at a public telecom, you look at your parole officer's contact number..."

Add gruesome backstory details to taste.

I'm with Toturi here. There's never an excuse to kill your entire party. So they didn't do what you think's a good idea. They're the players, there's more of them than you, and the entire point of Shadowrun is to have fun. Maybe the party is sending you a message that they don't want to play deep nuanced games of the type you're trying to run. Maybe you should try making a campaign that the players will actually enjoy, like an all-mercenary game or something more like the Renraku Arcology shutdown. Or, if you just can't stand having massive combat in SR, play some other RP that works better from them like TINS.

Remember, this is a game. If nobody makes a decker the GM has no business making a Matrix run, and if nobody wants to be anything but a Samurai the game should obviously focus on combat.

Moonstone Spider, I agree with you on those points. If the PCs want combat give them combat.

However, something they would come to find before much time has passed, is that PCs have a short life expectancey when it comes to these types of campains. It's called shadowrun, because you want to get in without being noticed. 2 main reasons for this. Anonymity for you and you're Johnson, and because the corps have bigger and better weapons. Not to mention more of them.

If the want to play an all merc campain, that's a bit different. Then they are likely on even footing with there competition, however this is not neccissarily so. Also, depending where they are, there could be other threats. Not to mention, corps hire mercs because they are expendible.

And to the point of you have no reason to kill you're group, this is true. However were they to do something this stupid, any reasonable response would not be you killing them. It would be the world reacting. If I walk into a McDonalds (not that I ever would ) and started shooting people, the cops would have me in a sniper scope in short order.

I would have the place rigged with enough explosives to blow them into the next world! As soon as they go into said place BOOM!

end of problem, but if they were sneaky have it rigged to a window or something!

torz x

I just like big bangs thats all!........... BOOMSKY!!

The sad thing is, I can name at least two players from the group that Wounded Ronin and I are in that have actually done something like this...

5 letters...
VITAS

There was one instance of a PC (a decker) who decided to carry a poleaxe out in the open down the Seattle streets. Her solution to the problem was to fornicate with the patrolling Lone Star officer who spotted her in a back alley and kill him with said poleaxe during the afterglow. She then made the even MORE fatal error of simply casually walking away, still carrying the poleaxe. Needless to say, she found herself arrested a short time later, and made the final fatal mistake of trying to escape from the squad car she was in (not happening), and again when being transported from said cruiser to the station. It took half a dozen Lone Star officers and three bullets to bring her down, and her player (who was incredibly annoying, uncouth, rude, arrogant, and just a general @$$) quit the group soon-after.

There was an instance with another group I GMed for (A slight overlap between PCs from these two groups, when the group I GMed broke up, a couple of players from it joined my and Wounded Ronin's online shindig) who walked into a Lone Star precinct to report a crime she was trying to set someone else up for with a Force 6 Physical Mask spell and about 100,000 worth of military-spec equipment on her. Needless to say, she didn't last very long.

Finally, there's the situation that our intrepid PCs are in now. To give you some indication of the team's makeup, I'll go down the list of characters.
Layla, my character, is a Manic-Depressive Changeling ex-Yamatestu company woman whose running services were no longer required due to an unstable personality. Roland is an exceptionally fast gunslinger who plays his vindictive flaw very, very effectively. Brick is a troll with a PAC and an LMG, and he's about as intelligent as his name. Daisy (who posts here, but seeing as how her character had nothing to do with the events that transpired, I'll let her remain anonymous), Artifex, a snide quebecois coward who is always the first to flee and simultaneously the first to claim the loot. Finally, we have Wounded Ronin's character, Sho Kosugi, who is quite possibly the most annoying ninja that ever lived (sorry, dude, but it's true)

We've been doing some work for the Mafia, mostly against the yakuza and the Triads, and when the Triads went so far as to explode our ride home from a smuggling job in CalFree, we were stranded in the Northern Crescent between Tir and General Saito's playground. We manage to capture the sabateur, however, who informs us that the Triads responsible for the planning of the attack are meeting in a particular bar in the nearby city of Eureaka. Now, without naming names, one character who is not me came up with the idea of "making an example" out of this group by storming the bar, guns blazing. Now, the only two characters who would have stopped something like this weren't with us, through both in-character and OC decisions, and while Layla has an INT 7, she has extraordinarily little common sense, and is very excited to be able to use her C4 (as is her player, who never got to use it until now). So, we load up, and we stride in all Neo-style to this club. The security takes one look at us and runs screaming into the night. None of the young patrons in the bar (All college-age or so) seem to care. That is, until the Troll says "I'm bringing my PAC into the bar with me." He then proceeds, through some sort of PC consensus, to block the one and only exit out of the club. Somehow we all survive the ensuing stampede, and get our vengeance, and Layla wires the place to explode, effectively destroying the secret happy fun Triad meetingplace behind and underneath the facility. Finally somebody decides to tell the troll to let everybody out, but the damage has been done. In our collective stupidity, we managed to take out close to 100 civilians with the half-dozen Triad members we took out. Oh, and aside from Layla, who had acquired a bike, and Artifex, who has levitate and invisibility, the only way for any of us to actually retreat is through an SUV that's already survived one barrage of bullets.

I wanted to post this, but I couldn't find an appropriate place, so thanks, WR for letting me share this, because this is a shining example of what NOT to do when planning and executing an attack, and how being in character can do wonders for shortening your lifespan. Feel free to criticize or mock away, we're all a little ashamed of this one.

-Magical Girl Pretty Matt

Ambush team with heavy-duty tasers. In my experience, several PCs slack off on the whole "adding non-conductive layers to armor" thing, focusing on sheer ballsitic values and killing ability. Or the ever-popular neurostun splash grenade...Gamma-scopolamine if you want to make sure. Send them off to a show trial and a nice stew in jail, and then -maybe- have a contact or someone bust them out so they can start again in a new city...if you're generous.

As people said here before, that's omly if you think the area of the sprawl where this happened warrants that much attention.

Very simmilar thing actually happened to a group I was GMing. It was the streets of a AA neighborhood though and they made use of a panther as well as a HMG. During the firefight an off duty cop had been killed while radioing in the incedent (the players didnt' know this). At any rate they were making good their escape and patting each other on the back while congradulating themselves on a job well done. The ensuing firefight unfolded as followed.

Me: You tear down the suburban streets towards the highway interchange that will take you back to Redmond. All of a sudden you hear the rythmic thupping of a number of helicopters above you.
PC1: **** How'd they find us?! This is stupid!
Me: Yes, very stupid that the cops respond to running gun battles in the middle of suburbia.
PC2: I go astral and try to find the chopper.
Me: Ok, best start some astral combat then as a pair of fire elementals attempt to rip you a new one. Roll roll roll
Me: PC2, your brains are oozing out of your skull
PC1: What they've sent mages after us?!
Me: yes mages are a part of Lone Star too, they are an equal oppertunity employer. Anyhow as this is going on a voice comes over the intercom on the chopper ordering you to pull over and surrender or you will be fired upon.
PC3: I pull out my HMG and start shooting at it out of the sunroof.
Me: Ok, roll roll roll your rounds ping off the armour of the first yellowjacket without much effect the offspray beside it ajusts it's course slightly and you see a muzzle flash appear in the side door, make a body test. roll roll roll ok PC3 your' now sporting a shiny new greapfruit sized exit wound in your chest put their by the swat sniper in the ospray. You've left the residential area and are entering some new developments, part of Renraku's new urban renewal program.
PC1 I shoot down the offspray with my panther! Roll roll roll, burn karma buy successes.
Me: Congradulations you took out one of the motors and you think you see a figure fall from the side as the offspray ceases persuit.
PC1: Yeah that's the ****!
PC4: I never said I would enter an area of the city without development now they can shoot at us!
Me: You said you were taking the most direct route to the highway, this is it.
PC4: Well I turn around then!
Me: Ok make a drive check. roll roll roll success. Ok as you turn around the yellowjacket turns around with you and opens up with a chaingun on the roof of your car. Roll roll roll... your car has a body of 3? Best be making a damage resistance check for 10D AV ammo roll roll roll fail terribly. Your car is now a smoking wreck flipping end over end down the street. Your bodies are identified using DNA samples and cremated before being intered in a prison cemetary. Congradulations please get new character sheets.