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Message no. 1
From: Brett Borger <bxb121@***.EDU>
Subject: Bug Eyed Shadowrunners
Date: Fri, 12 Sep 1997 14:55:06 EST
Inspired by an article or two in the latest Inquest (bought to get my
Hachetman 2057 :) ) I am thinking up a new campaign with a
particularly twisted plotline.

Basically, I want to lead my players into believing that an alien
spacecraft was shot down and crashed. The remains are being help
(and fought over) by different corps, with other corps trying to find
out what is going on. I want to draw this out over time, and
increase the "alien" feel, as well as the "unknown new tech"
concerns. But most of all, I want the players to be totally confused
as to the "aliens". I want them convinced they exist, without proof.


In the end, of course, since I don't want aliens in my game, it will
turn out to be something innocent. But if I do this right, my
players will never believe that. :)

Ideas? Suggestions? I haven't even figured out what IS going to be
happening instead of the aliens. Perhaps some gene-tinkering, or
maybe a few new minor tech toys that look impressive, leading to
suspiscions of bigger tech toys? Maybe just hot air by a second tier
corp about to go under, who are trying to drive their stock up?

Just to make it REAL fun, I may combine this to run at the same time
I run a game inspired by someone on here (I forget, but thanks!) by
using a Hamlet plotline. I can either put the runners in the role of
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern (also a great play!) or I have one
character who has a brother and parents that could fill the roles :)
Message no. 2
From: Max Rible <slothman@*********.ORG>
Subject: Re: Bug Eyed Shadowrunners
Date: Fri, 12 Sep 1997 11:11:56 -0800
At 14:55 9/12/97 EST, Brett Borger wrote:
>Basically, I want to lead my players into believing that an alien
>spacecraft was shot down and crashed. The remains are being help
>(and fought over) by different corps, with other corps trying to find
>out what is going on. I want to draw this out over time, and
>increase the "alien" feel, as well as the "unknown new tech"
>concerns. But most of all, I want the players to be totally confused
>as to the "aliens". I want them convinced they exist, without proof.

Well, the first thing to do is to figure out why someone is staging
the thing to look like alien technology. It shouldn't be hard to get
a mage to invent a spell that lets you reshape materials to look very
organic and bizarre. Getting the reshaped craft into orbit and then
smacking it into the right place should do for being convincing-- leave
a thoroughly picked-over crash site. (It'll *have* to be simulated in
some way. Making something convincing happen by accident would be
tricky.)

>Ideas? Suggestions? I haven't even figured out what IS going to be
>happening instead of the aliens. Perhaps some gene-tinkering, or
>maybe a few new minor tech toys that look impressive, leading to
>suspiscions of bigger tech toys? Maybe just hot air by a second tier
>corp about to go under, who are trying to drive their stock up?

You could make the real boojum be organic technology. Doped polymers can
conduct currents, and I think someone figured out how to dope a buckytube
into being a superconductor. It could all have started when a marketing
type went into the lab where they were growing a power transformer and
said, "Hey, that looks kind of H R Giger-like..." and grown from there
to drive the company's stock up. ("They have the alien technology!")
They could have a whole plan involving lots of really creepy psychotropic
black IC defending their data files on the Matrix (which are all corrupted
when you finally manage to download them, because they were corrupt when
they were *uploaded*), massive security to keep out shadowrunners...

--
%% Max Rible %% slothman@*****.com %% http://www.amurgsval.org/~slothman/ %%
%% "Before enlightenment: sharpen claws, catch mice. %%
%% After enlightenment: sharpen claws, catch mice." - me %%
Message no. 3
From: Brett Borger <bxb121@***.EDU>
Subject: Re: Bug Eyed Shadowrunners
Date: Fri, 12 Sep 1997 15:35:53 EST
> Well, the first thing to do is to figure out why someone is staging
> the thing to look like alien technology. It shouldn't be hard to
> get a mage to invent a spell that lets you reshape materials to look
> very organic and bizarre. Getting the reshaped craft into orbit and

A little too-heavy handed. I want so little to be done that there is
no evidence to prove it either way. A smart corp trying to fake it
would be denying every rumor that came its way, plus an extra one
that didn't. :) Someone tries to look into it, and finds everything
innocent....too innocent. The rumors go wild, everyone believes it,
and the corp is innocent of faking anything. If there is evidence,
or if it is done too obviously, the runners will catch on and it
won't be as good for the players.
> growing a power transformer and said, "Hey, that looks kind of H R
> Giger-like..." and grown from there to drive the company's stock up.
> ("They have the alien technology!") They could have a whole plan
> involving lots of really creepy psychotropic black IC defending
> their data files on the Matrix (which are all corrupted when you
> finally manage to download them, because they were corrupt when they
> were *uploaded*), massive security to keep out shadowrunners...

Now that sounds good. Thanks for the advice!

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