works for me, I don't mind it, I do want things to work out.

Seeing as this has limited to do with me short of not losing a partner, I'm okidoki with it. ^-^

Yeah that's fine with me. I really don't like this kind of change in a game though, but it's clearly for the best and the enjoyment of all.

Also, did I see them? I guess not since they aren't near the entrance anymore, but ... what do I see? Who do I recognize?

EDIT: I'd like to know more about the Mentor spirit business.. Is he always following the dwarf on the astral plane? I thougth these were mentors that you see once in a while and give you a task or tell you you did something wrong and whatever. Why is he always following every move of his follower?

@gobogen: Yeah, I don't care for this sort of thing either, but like you said, i think it's for the best.
Ok, let's start by describing the situation. Because there has been the the change in story so that the dwarf never went invisible. netlich's character would only have sent out the message about rumor control needed, and not the one to keep watch out for the dwarf trying to escape.
Upon entering the club it seems like any other night you have been in there. Plenty of people on the dance floor and a crowd of people by the bar. There is no sign of any trouble or that any trouble happened in the recent past so you are quite curious as to just what was the rush for you to get over here for.
You don't immediately spot Mark, Tempty, and Jack sitting in a corner booth. However, as you make your way to the bartender who is likely to know where Tempty has gotten to since she's such a regular, you are able to spot the horned head of Mark over in the corner. Moving closer, you can also see Tempty sitting at the table. At first you don't notice the smallish dwarf, but when you do spot him sitting there your first thoughts are something along the lines of "Guess that's the cause of dragging me out here...."
Then you do a double-take as you realize you know the dwarf. Its been a few years, but you'd swear he was one of the paramedic's that saved your mother when she had that horrible accident. "What the hell is this shit?" you might think to yourself.

@All: To answer gobogen's question on Mentor Spirits:
The way he has described Mentor Spirits is the typical way they are handled. But each one is a manifestation unique to the person they are connected to. I'm allowing them to be constant companions for both Celia and Jack because it adds a certain interesting dynamic to the game.
However, I am having them be within the players own minds. So while the mento spirits may be seen/heard in physical space or astral space by the awakened character they are connected to, they cannot be seen/heard by others.
For example, Celia's mentor spirit may appear within astral space for her to 'talk' to, but another astrally perceiving character also there would not be able to see it.

Hmm...i just realized something, it's been quite a while since we've heard from Whizbang the group's hacker. I need to find out if she's planning to start posting again. When I talked to her at the beginning of the year she said she would, but haven't heard from her since.

*nods* that was essentially how I was permitting Snake to exist. In a sense, he's a super-spirit, so he's 'masking himself' as far as being around casually goes. I stuck in a subtle, myself only implication that he talked to Pet Rock. But he's not going to tell anyone that . Otherwise, unless I 'summoned' Snake in a genuine body, he doesn't get me anything I don't get myself. He's a roleplaying tool. Naturally, spirits summoned of him aren't 'him' personally, more like semi-avatars or else spirits under him, etc, etc.

I hope we don't lose another one. >.< lol...

erk, and on a side note. I guess pretend me and Snakey didn't do quite as much as we did...bah. silly rewinds...

My pet rock is a catalyst/filter to my mentor spirit. I only get cryptic sayings and cliches. My mentor has a job for me to do. She helps me and I help her. Unless I screw things up or a certain enviremental issues occur.

Snake is a subset of my mentor. My Pet rock has no mana or intelligence. it is a communication device between my mentor and me.
Do spirits talk to each other? or are they all one spirit that we each see differently. This is what Wang Chi and I have been working on. inantimate objects have no mana, only living things do. But elementals have mana and they are summoned from the meta/astral plane. So they have mana when they come to our plane. I believe Spirits summon us to the meta/astral planes like we summon elementals.

Damn. OK, I'll edit my post so that everything is rewinded correctly, then make a new post as well.

And those explanations on mentor spirits are interesting. I already had figured that it was mostly a role-playing tool too. Expending on concepts like that is the kind of novelty I like to find in forum games. gj guys.

*gets Gobogen a pet rat spirit, just so he can enjoy the antics of a metaphysical rodent constantly at his ear* :>

*gets a meta-stick enchanted with arcane beat-the-crap-out-of-vermin spells to get rid of the astral rodent biting his ears

Yeah I kinda like the comic relief/divine intervention usage of the mentor spirits by both persons. they are also a nice addition to roelplaying tools to provide different angles and perspectives in a post. Perhaps Mark might develop a new psychosis...Split CyberPersonality and start talking to his commlink or smartlink... With so much AI software running inside him and his low logic and charisma it could easily happen


On a second note - to be realistic perhaps we need to calculate the time that passes before Taku gets to the club although for simplicity shake and to move the scene forward (which I am aching to do) I won't mind if he joins immediately

Additionally :

a) Would Shalimar or Slacker mind if we share fixers with Tempty strengthening the bonds ebtween the group? I got a fixer contact [1/2] which would not interfere with Tempty relationship with him - just give us a common gorund to base our past experiences on and how we got together. My contacts low ratings would also account for Hammer to have joined this group lately and not having been in many runs with them...

b)
Not to make a fuss...But Mark is my character's (still fake) yet real life assumed name so he doesn't feel comfortable when it is used in public. He prefers the Hammer when doing business. But this is a minor detail and I have no probs with it...He ould easily have more alias in the back of his hand


I will be posting the general concept of the character soon.In essense what you people who have been in the ran with him know of the troll street sam.

c)
I think with Mark's very low Charisma and the general situation in the cubicle it should take an easy pereption roll for Taku to realise that things are much more chilly than outward appearances say...Although definetely not the crisis hinted at the message yet the "something's wrong" feeling is easily discernible...Both Mark and Tempty where thinking of Offing the dwarf and now they heard that someone's after them...

I don't mind sharing a fixer. I would point out though that he is a very well connected fixer though (rating 4), meaning he fixes for the entire region... don't know how you would square that up exactly with the rating 2 you would have him at?

Easily he is not loyal to me...I dont' sleep with him

Tsk tsk tsk...imagine that! Sleeping with a sexy Gunbunny at the same period he's trading bodily fluids with a StreetSammie Troll??? Man there goes my supper....

Sorry I should have elaborated more on the serious stuff rather than the joke...

What I meant was that since I do not know him well yet (let us say he got me a job or two in the past , one of them being with this group of Tempty and co.). Therefore he is simply just starting with me. He got me nice jobs and I delivered professionally. Which means he becomes a contact of mine too.

You know him more intimately (sp?) so he would go to his full extend to get you connected (conn:4). In my case though he doesn't owe me nothing so if I ask for something he ain't goona do as much hard work for me as he would do for you(hence half conection for meuntil I raise it in game).


Am I making sense?

Here's an example:

I got another contact like yours , a street doc. Perhaps after a couple of runs he gets to patch you up a few times. We discuss it with Slacker and decide that he becomes your contact too. In story terms you got to know him through your dealings and you can now directly use his skills without going trough me asking him to help you as Mark's co-runner. Me and him go way back so he will do his best to find something for me (let's say a specific substance as he is a street doc). He is a recent aquintance of yours though so it would not be realistic for him to risk his rep and name for someone he knows only through a few runs and through a mutual but good friend, would it? Hence he would have lower loyalty and subsequently willing to share less of his connections for ya?

I agree with what netlich is saying about contacts. I think that is the essence of the rules.

As per calling him Mark, I'm sorry I just didn't notice his alias much yet, but I would have called him Hammer (will edit unless Slacker says it's not okay to). As per what my character thinks, it has to do with a) the "threat" is someone he knows to be a good doctor, sort of; b) the laughing; c) the lack of commotion, screams etc, whereas he was called in for rumor control. I just chose to roleplay that Taku is pissed because he is under the impression that nothing huge is happening for now.

Yup gotcha. Am sure that Taku will be satisfied with the need for rumour control as soon as he gets the lowdown...

By the way -I think Tempty has no visible wounds from yesterday, how about Taku? I think you made a post about most of them having healed right?

I don't believe she has any visible wounds, no.

hehe, stalking horse, that's funny.

I prefer to think of sending out a pony in heat and wrangling up all the studs and and whatnot...but then I'd be accusing Tempty of being a lesbian.

So I guess we'll stick to stalking horse, lol.

And Adept eh? well, small risk there if he tries perceiving, otherwise I'm not so worried. It's fun having a spirit available to relay all this too. - who needs cyberears when you got one of those? ^-^

A day's rest was enough for Taku to heal all his wounds. Maybe it's because of the short japanese type having a fast methabolism, who knows He's still got marks and some damage, but he's 100% functional in game terms.

A lot of posting going on today. I have sent Whizbang a PM to check to see if she plans on continuing with the game. I'll also message her next time I see her logged into AIM (which reminds me, I am pretty much always logged into AIM, even while at work, so if any of you use it, you can message me, the name is Morrolan3, just tell me your name so that I can add it to my allowed list).

As far as sharing contacts go, that is fine, though the typical the Connection rating is interpretted as a rating to determine the abilities of the Fixer and is unrelated to the character; and Loyalty is a rating to determine the relationship between fixer and character.

By the way, adepts can have Mentor Spirits if they want. Its a quality open to all awakened characters.
The Hammer would be a bit out of luck though. However, you could simulate something similar by buying an agent that you leave running on your commlink. This would be two fold, it could provide some extra security on your commlink and it would give you a great opportunity for internal debates with it

Oh and if anybody is injured, I can't even remember who all got injured, speak up so we can go ahead and get the rolling out of the way to heal you up. As gobogen has already said, he's rolled his healing and he's back to full health, I'm sure he has some bandages and such on, but functionally he is fine.

I love the activity level of this game. It's really caught up after being down for about a month.

Hehe. Same here...With this being my virgin appearance in the forums and my first attempt at 4th edition I managed to spend the whole previous scenario fighting a damn spirit! HEheheh- I am hoping I will manage to do a bit more in this one


As far as messangers are concerned I will see if I can register with AIM....I am using MSN and ICQ infrequently so I am just get that one too...Perhaps get them to ran via one of those multi-messanger thingies

k I got me AIM with 'NetlichStef' as a nickname...First time I found netlich taken...Tsk tsk tsk....

Stim patches help. *shows the belly of the game, and the several lighter shades of figurative flesh beneath* Put me to sleep though, lol. (went to take a nap, and it went literal)

and it's amazing the names that will be taken on AIM, lol. I don't know if I will IM you or not Slacker, but I would have Kaylos96 as mine.

Btw, in case it wasn't clear, when I used italics in my post, it meant that I was relating Taku's thoughts. He actually didn't say anything. Just for clarity's sake.

Yeah same here.

Now I need some sugeestions.I thought that this scene was getting under control but th emore I think and sleep on it the more I amloosing control again. I can't see why my character would sit still in there and listen ot all this instead of going and coming back to find th einfo he needs when in a better position and better armed?

He had the antiques of Jack first and then it turns out that Jack had an associate who managed ot eavesdrop on them without getting noticed. Nothing stops the situation from getting out of hand and the more likelyscenario I can thinkfor this is that a bait is send in to get the Sahdowrunners ruffled and get them to gather around the bait only for th etrap to close in aftewrwards...Or am I being biased towards one way of thinking now?

Remmeber I am tryin gto play the stereotypical shadowrunning street sam who has survived a few runs and has some at least basic ettiquette and intution to handle himself in situations like this. He will not start a fight in a public place but neither will he let people who knwo about him live as long as he knows they don't have somehting bigger behind them backing them. To me Ceilia's introduction just turned the tables again and confused me

@netlich: If you sent that as a text message, it would be able to appear as an ARO in Taku's field of vision thanks to his contact lenses.
As far as the situation goes, I think Celia shows obvious signs of trying to use shadowtalk to continue the discussion a little more covertly considering it is in public and you have already showed a desire to keep it that way. She's not trying to be cryptic, just showing that she know's what she's doing.
If you like, you can roll Intuition + Charisma to judge her intentions.

Frankly, that she is even around tells us that we may want to pop her. Only 4 groups knew about the job. The Johnson who hired us (and could contact us through Garland), Garland (as the fixer), Us(runners), and the people that were the target of the run. Tempty would know it wasn't Garland, or the Runners that would put people out looking for the team, and the Johnson can already contact them through Garland. That leaves only the opposition from the run, in which case Celia is in bed with people that are hunting the team.

well, besides the bed (which is nice and soft btw), keep in mind that sometimes, people of your caliber (ICly speaking) may end up showing themselves on occasion. She's not going to sit idle an let you consider disposing of her willy nilly, she'll either try to get you to listen, consider the option, or else keep you spinning around long enough to escape.

Of course, you guys don't know that ICly either, so I have to rely on a little finesse an some metagame partnership to get along.

Well not to start a conspiracy theory chain reaction but on Salimar's thoghts: taking Garland off the picture as I agree, any of the runners, and especially MArk who has only done one run with the group, could be the bird-that-talked. So I would not completely blame it on the newcomers. Besides I did say I want this to move on OOC-wise...

But I do want it to move on realistically... And to that extend I have to agree with Shalimar in saying that all that we have managed to do is upgrade Jack &Celia from marked for removal to marked for surveilance...But anyway - it might be intersting to see how this develops - as long as we manage to keep it away form the usual let's blow our heads off instead of the bad guys


As for the intuition roll I was just saying that we have just been through that level of talk and we have managed to come to a middle level agreement with Jack to take a corner -read private- place and he is to spill it all out...Someone who was eavesdropping IMO should get all that and start from there. And not take us back to the 'let's talk the talk' phase before we get into the main course...I mean Tempty when angered and scolding JAck essentially gave any eavesdroppers confirmation with her words that she (and therfore me too) IS all that JAck is claimming. Which is why I (Mark) can't see any reason to hide behind fake aliases and lingo/jargon street- talk anymore. I just want to get this over with as soon as possible and with the most favourable outcome to my rep possible and then see about damage and rumour control which will definetely include change of street aliases and removal of any untrustworthy contacts that know of Mark's involvement in this...I think this is realistic in my point of view.

Of course I do understand the other side of the coin. Ceilia was evaesdropping and we got no whiff of that so anyone could be doing it...Therefore she is right to behave as she is...

Which brings me to my original dilema and frankly I haven't yet found any way out but this: I split , do my research and meet the newcomers again (whether they want to or not) on what I will consider a more favourable situation and terrain....even without their consent.

I threw in a proposition for ya, no worries! lol

on a side note, I seemed to have...misplaced...my side mission info. ^-^; I think I remember it correctly, but I'm not certain if it actually involved a koala or not. O_o

No fair is fair...The rules and constraints work if applied to both sides

I got my propsition on th etable too...In a troll street-sammie kinda way


NOTE TO SELF : Need to simplify my stupid let's imitate a rough troll speaking text! I am starting to sound like an Irish Assassin!!!!

I will just cut the shortening of phrases and stuff - I think we all got th epictur that although Mark is a pro and knows his way aorund meetings he is still a troll and a not very charismatic in this...I am nto gonna be writting everytext of his speech like that anymore...I probably will caus emore problems that provide realism

*makes some giggle noises, then makes several watcher spirits repeat it at several different decibels and speeds*

Its at this point that I am going to have to step out of the game. The only help Tempty will give Celia at this point is help into a grave. She admitted that she is being paid to dig up dirt on the runners, by the group that the runners just hit. Its a prelude to the runners getting eliminated, or merely mauled(at best). There is no way that they would let her sell information about them to someone that they had just pissed off.

I'm sorry if this sticks in people's craws, but... yea. At this point the most viable move from Tempty's eyes is to kill both of them, and then search for Wang Chi on her own.

Well I am not gonna insist you stay as I would rather have players around me who enjoy roleplaying this story and if the situation and our actions brought it to a point where you are loosing this then I wouldn't stay if I were at your palce either...

But I am kinda taking another view of thwe whole issue that might help things along. To me this seems as more realistic Shadowrun than what I usually get into. Let me explain...


We are at a point where all characters have pretty much completely different agenda's but it is also out there to see for everybody now which makes it even more obvious

But we all have a common goal. Find out what happened to Wang Chi and find out who is behind him. If we stick toegther without trusting each other for our own reasons we cna mold the story into a realistic Shadowrun story where truly everybody mistrusts everybody....Which is the way I understand Shadowruns...

Indeed killing someone who threatens your reputation is a solution but not always the best solution. If a runers partners dissappear that runner's rep and forthcoming missions are bound to decrease...And he is bound to have more enemies in the end....

The way I see this story and find it interesting is as follows in the next post:

It's also a possibility the rest of the group will fight you on the option, ICly, Shalimar. That's a realistic possibility - you try to load up guns or whatever, while someone else starts unloading them right behind you, or something.

But I can understand the situation at hand. Maybe, game wise, it's a good idea to have Tempty split off to do some searching of her own while the others take their risk? *shrugs* just a thought. Don't neccessarily have to leave.

- - -

And, people could always tell me to just leave, and then we encounter one another later on in the great search? Is that feasible at all?

Its not a protect your rep issue, its a "If she sells them this info on us, we may very well wind up dead"

I know it's not a rep issue, lol.

Bear in mind you don't have to say it was you guys either. You could offer to pay me or whatever else, and pretend you have no bloody clue what I'm talking about. Lie to Celia if it's accurate to the person.

This is form my point of view obviously and I don't mean to insult anyone.

Tempty is turning out to be a kill first ask questions later kinda gal. So watch your steps around her as you are not likeley to get second chances. Perhaps though she might also be a barking dog that doesn't bite? She threatens a lot to cover her own insecurities?...etc...This concepot could become an in party joke as well, where every wrong commment geats a death threat by Tempty ...Of course as long as these jokes don't underman her lethality and everybody respects her and the fact she iss the GunBunny and she can indeed come true with her Death threats...

Ceilia is the mystery woman that could be working against or with us. But before Mark decides he needs to kill her he needs to know a few things...Like who has hired her...killing her only to find a few pals of a Major Shadowrunning Legend Name are after you; just because you messed in their plot aint gonna fix anything and will probably send you too in the grave...So MArk has already decided that he first gets to the root of things and then starts killing...If rumours spread out too much this is bad but unavoidable...First he has to realise the extend of the damage and then starts repairring it. In fact there are so many other situations we are overlooking...Even if Ceilia is behind Wang Chi's dissapearance perhaps it might turn out she is more use to us alive as we can pay her double and get her to work for us (if she proves she is worth it of course) after her gathering of info job is done no one forces us to hire her. Perhaps it turns out she was hired to gather that info for a good cause (very very doubfull)...

Jack...Well he can easily be both the comic relief and the dramatic relief character. Relate, if you may, to Mafia movies where the least suitable guy is forced into such a situation.... Just do the parallelism...A guy who knows nothing of Mafia ettiquette realises a friend of his who he knows is related to Mafia Gangs is in trouble and he tries to find him to warn him...Having lost touch with him at a very crucial time he is left with no option than to go looking for him. His gruff and rough character though gets him originally in trouble as he says and acts the wrong way...That doesn't necessarily kill him though as the MAfia people he meets find usage for him and his knowledge...In fact I am already considering developing Mark as taking Jack under his wing and tutoring him in Shadowrunning. in fact personality wise the only thing that might rescue someone from Mark's wrath is bravery...People who look hiom in the eye after it is obvious they are in trouble, have much more a chance to live than those who grovel and beg; and Jack was stupidly brave in that respect...



I have not factored in Taku yet but his neutral stance up to now has cerated no problems yet...

@Shalimar: I'd hate to see you leave the group, but I can see where you are coming from.
I'm actually rather surprised see that Cold-Dragon revealed somebody hired her to find information.....
But she did just say information. I would expect your character to want to know what kind of information she is looking for (OOC, I will go ahead and tell you that the information has nothing to do with the team or its members).
Also, you are failing to realize that in a world such as Shadowrun, there can be dozens of different parties interested in a single item. If some megacorp has some new product that is going to net them billions in nuyen all 9 other megacorps are going to do their best to get it or at least prevent the originating corp from profiting from it (OOC, I will go ahead and tell you that it is not the people that you hit that hired her).
The idea of you heading off on your own is also a possibilty, I'd be perfect fine with roleplaying out your actions parrallel to the rest of the players' action. Who knows, maybe you'll eventually find some mutual ground again.

Sorry, I can't elaborate more, but I'm already late getting back to work right now after having read what everybody's been posting. I'll try to make some time tonight (though I already had plans, so we can discuss this further).

@Cold-Dragon: You'll have to wait until at least tonight for me to find the stuff on your back story, sorry.

No worries, I think we're all on break, more or less, at this point. ^-^;

As far as saying someone hired me, that is a completely vague statement, which insures, sotospeak, confidentiality of who's business is nosing in. For all they know, My Mother is the employer (she's not, but it could happen!).

And as shadowrunners, it'd be silly to say I'm just nosing about something I have no business nosing into. They already know something is up with Jack. As his so-called partner, it's only natural to wonder on such things.

The catch, however, is that Jack is with me, so to say I'm working for someone sneaky, would suggest he is too. Unless I'm using him.

But that goes back into the conspiracy ring, which we don't need to get back into right now. ^-^;

To be honest I would be surprised/ annoyed if Tzaz and Ceilia did not say some things that will eventually and after much scrutiny turn out truthfull ...The situation was that that we all needed to hear somethign that sounds truthfullotherwise they would have to be offed just for toying with us and especially with Tmepty in her own yard...

To me the fact that Cold-Dragon did offer the fact she is lookign for information is kinda bad IC but extremely helpfull OOC as it is an obvious hint and nice ploy to get things flowing...We (as in MArk, Taku and Tempty) NEED to find what Ceilia is after...By killing her there and then we just blunder as badly as we claim Jack blunders...
Waht if Ceilia already HAS info on us and upon her death that info gets given to the wrong persons? If we wanna play paranoid there are countless scenarios I cna come up with...Which is why Mark suggested a second meet tomorrow upon which some basic research will have commenced...

By the way is Whizbang still in? Caus eI definetely need a hacker for MArk's research ideas

I'll tell you what, there are alternatives more drastic then what has been mentioned and that Taku would consider. Up to now, he didn't know half the story if any part of it, but as it unfolds in front of him, he has formed opinions.

A possibility would definitely be - at least for Taku - to leave this sprawl, having assassinated or not a bunch of people before leaving to cover his tracks (more likely having killed them then not). The people still "on his side" would stay alive of course, but he would split from then at least for a period of 5 years. There are other sprawls to go to.. and it's worth considering those places as safer even if more uncertain and unknown.

Anyways, I'm with Shalimar here for the most part. The safest thing to do is by far to kill and disappear ... forever. Maybe go away, change face, change name, change contacts, and come back.

A situation like this one in the shadows generally leads to a quick death. Of course Slacker convinces me that it's not the case, yet Taku doesn't know that and can't really trust anyone except Tempty at this point. And it turns out Taku will back her up when shit hits the fan.

Ok this does not look promising at all...

Now I would like Slacker's trake on the following but no matter what I may be thinking on the other levels I am kinda sure we are rushing a bit further IC and considering things that may have only been mentioned OOC...

The following is what I consider IC.

Way I see it...Jack has indeed blundered a bit but that won't necessarily means he is dead...yet. It will defintely mean that things are not looking good for him and looking even worse for him joinning us....The key here is joinning us after finding Wan Chi... Basic Resource Management 101 should easily tell even a low intelligent Troll like mine that before you discard even the worst item first you scan its uses ... So as far as I am concerned Tzaz can still play during this scenario and make it interesting and different than usual. The fact remains he is someone still under suspicion and yet seemingly truthfull about his being completelyout of the Shadowrun and shadoworld concept. Remember my Mafia movie example - I find it as a good paradigm.

Ceilia has appeared and given info that needs double checking. But up to know she has only said:

Well the concept of the Mafia movie does have a lot of interest to me. Think Reservoir Dogs for instance. Who to trust? What to do?

My point is that I do not promess I won't try to kill someone. I don't promess I won't take drastic action if I am sure that it is realistic. For now, I can buy your general argument, netlich, that they should not die just yet. But they're clearly on my list when we're done with them, their info, and the substory. I just want to let that be known, cause some players can't accept inter-player distrust/violence/killing.

I think it makes sense. Taku doesn't need to go away necessarily just yet, but he'll make the arrangements. He doesn't need to kill the two, but he'll keep on the ready for when it is required. I leave the door open for them to save themselves, but I can't ignore that Taku is a cold-blooded, professional killer that does not take possible threats to his person lightly.

well...at least I know I'll have a challenge at some point if I make it through finding Wang! lol....*starts sorting out spell options...*

ugh, waiting for people makes me feel like I'm on trial. >.< stupid impatience, heh. No offense to those present of course. I'm the problem (and I'm stuck with three kids - not good conditions).