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Message no. 1
From: HALOWEEN JACK <SBC3KCB@*******.ac.uk>
Subject: I need some ideas!
Date: Thu, 2 Nov 1995 10:25:49 GMT
Last night I had a stroke genius, while running the short adventure
from the shadowland book. The group consisting of a snake shaman,a
physical adept,a troll rigger,a mage,and a dwarven demolitions expert.
So initially when the phone call came through the group said yes, and
proceded with the adventure.
Things went terribly wrong when the shaman scouted the monorail
station astrally and failed a perception check, they entered the
station thinking that there was no snatch squads there. Eventually
the snatch squad escaped (only the elven mage survived) with the box.
A chase followed culminating in the group retriving the box, but the
monorail station was now crawling with LS cops.
So then they decide to open the box.
..
..
..
What happened next caused so very nasty responses, the inside the box
was layered with a cloth containing nutrients and FAT bacteria.
Inside the clothe was a fist sized gem blood red in colour ,astral
perception of the gem showed an astral presence within the gem.
The shaman thinking this looked interesting, thought that maybe
she could go on an astral quest to find out the true nature of the gem
(I allowed this as you can quest for a beings true aura).To cut a
long story short she was killed on the astral quest (rating 10) but
managed to survive when the physical adept used biotech on her to
stabilise her(two rather nice rolls of 17 and 21). The shaman was
then taken to hospital where she was charged o stupid amount to be
healed by a shamanic doctor.
When the returned to the rig an Ares Citymaster, they found the
doors hanging off its hinges and the box gone and a note
saying,"don't frag with me, ED..."
Edward is a grade 8 initiated vampire blood mage, and while the gem
was in the van I had each character make a roll as if they had taken
a deadly wound. This really freaked they mages and the adept as they
all lost magic.
After leaving the van they started to gain back the magic by
doing the same role,(if the rolled higher than there MR then they got
the point back) needless to say one character failed one of the rolls
and is now seriously miffed.


Could I have some suggestions on possible effects of the gem? baring
in mind that the gem is semi vampiric and ED is a vampire blood mage.

J....
Message no. 2
From: Marc A Renouf <jormung@*****.umich.edu>
Subject: Re: I need some ideas!
Date: Thu, 2 Nov 1995 13:19:03 -0500 (EST)
On Thu, 2 Nov 1995, HALOWEEN JACK wrote:

> Could I have some suggestions on possible effects of the gem? baring
> in mind that the gem is semi vampiric and ED is a vampire blood mage.

How about addiction similar to that of having one's Essence
drained? It would be quite interesting to have one of the players
obsessing over the gem, wanting to horde it and have it all to him or
herself. That could lead to all sorts of trouble.

Marc
Message no. 3
From: HALOWEEN JACK <SBC3KCB@*******.ac.uk>
Subject: Re: I need some ideas!
Date: Fri, 3 Nov 1995 12:56:24 GMT
> Date sent: Thu, 2 Nov 1995 13:15:17 -0500
> Send reply to: shadowrn@********.itribe.net
> From: Marc A Renouf <jormung@*****.umich.edu>
> To: Multiple recipients of list <shadowrn@********.itribe.net>
> Subject: Re: I need some ideas!

>
>
> On Thu, 2 Nov 1995, HALOWEEN JACK wrote:
>
> > Could I have some suggestions on possible effects of the gem? baring
> > in mind that the gem is semi vampiric and ED is a vampire blood mage.
>
> How about addiction similar to that of having one's Essence
> drained? It would be quite interesting to have one of the players
> obsessing over the gem, wanting to horde it and have it all to him or
> herself. That could lead to all sorts of trouble.
>
> Marc
>
Now that could be an interesting idea, as the vampire blood mage now
has the gem. One of the PC's in my group, his arch nemesis is the
very same blood mage. So I could have one member of the group trying
to avoid the vampire like the plague, and the other trying to find
him to get the gem back.
Interesting as I am trying to run a game where the down time is
roleplayed, most of the players in down time just sat around waiting
for the next phonecall from a Mr Johnson. Now we have a female phys
ad with bisexual tendancies, a 13 year old snake shaman trying to
find out "The Edge's"/Jake/Silvines background, Silvine spending all
his time warding his home to stop Edward the vampire blood mage from
attacking him.
Message no. 4
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Valeu John EMFA)
Subject: I need some ideas
Date: Fri Oct 26 02:45:01 2001
Ok, after we pulled back into port and had our leave period, my players
scattered faster then cockroaches in light.
(Hell one has even gone AWOL- but that's a story I'm still trying to figure
out.)

Anyway right now I have 2 riggers and a wildcard (doesn't know what to play
yet)

Anyone got any left over story ideas that I can
plagiarize/borrow/steal/maim/torture/screw up?


EMFA John Valeu
-AKA- TimeKeeper
"Don't put off tomorrow what you can do today, because it's just a matter of
time."
Message no. 5
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Malcolm)
Subject: I need some ideas
Date: Fri Oct 26 06:10:01 2001
Sounds like you need a mage and then its all set for Smuggling runs up and
down the UCAS?
----- Original Message -----
From: "Valeu John EMFA" <ValeuJ@*************.navy.mil>
To: "'Shadowrun Mailing list'" <shadowrn@*********.com>
Sent: Friday, October 26, 2001 7:36 AM
Subject: I need some ideas


> Ok, after we pulled back into port and had our leave period, my players
> scattered faster then cockroaches in light.
> (Hell one has even gone AWOL- but that's a story I'm still trying to
figure
> out.)
>
> Anyway right now I have 2 riggers and a wildcard (doesn't know what to
play
> yet)
>
> Anyone got any left over story ideas that I can
> plagiarize/borrow/steal/maim/torture/screw up?
>
>
> EMFA John Valeu
> -AKA- TimeKeeper
> "Don't put off tomorrow what you can do today, because it's just a matter
of
> time."
>
>
>
>
Message no. 6
From: shadowrn@*********.com (shadowrn@*********.com)
Subject: I need some ideas
Date: Fri Oct 26 07:00:03 2001
Heh. I actually have an old one that I used (with considerable success)
still tumbling around my head, but it wouldn't really do for you. When a
group splits up for a while, taking on independent runs, well, each one gets
approached for a 'different part' of a major run. I'll use the examples from
my game:

Zeus, a Rigger
Gemini, a Decker
Ouroboros, a Shaman (sort of; good enough for this description)
Nemesis, a Samurai

They went their seperate ways for a while, and, basically, I had everyone
make up characters for the types they were missing, thus:

Zeus's player created a decker, a mage, and a samurai
Gemini's player created a Rigger, a mage, and a samurai
Ouro's player created a rigger, a decker, and a samurai
Nemesis' player created a rigger, a decker, and a mage.

(In these scenarios, just FYI, all the Riggers had to be fairly
well-equipped; all the mages had to be at least base-Grade Initiates; all the
deckers had to be basically civic-minded; and all the samurai had to be,
well, samurai. Good at hand-to-hand/swords and stuff, in any case; no guns
were allowed 'past the front door'.)

Each of the 'prime' characters was considered to be the 'lead player' for the
run -- which is to say, the only one I wasn't TOO likely to kill. All of the
secondary characters, on the other hand, were fair game, and were considered
to be 'open prospects' for AVMs, hails of gunfire, black IC, and
what-have-you. The players were encouraged to take contacts of theirs, or
(in one case) followers; these were -really- effective when they Bit The Big
One.

Each group was hired (or blackmailed, or, with the Samurai set, kidnapped) to
do a job. All of the jobs were facets of a major plot, but while all of the
jobs involved Aztlan/Aztechnology, none of the plots intersected each other
except at the very end (at which point most of the secondary characters were
dead, disabled, or left behind). To keep 'deceased' players happy, have your
opponents sketched out ahead of time, and start handing them off to the
'deceased'; it keeps the tension cranked up, and even increases it as your
players start squaring off against each other, the 'weaker' NPCs working to
take out the 'powerful' PCs. (Hey, who better to run that crack squad than
someone who's been playing with the GI Joe and knows what he's likely to do,
right?)

As I recall, this is what the runs were:

Riggers:
Job: Rip across the border and pick up the (insert famous artifact here -- I
used the Cross of Coronado) from an Aztechnology archaeological dig.
Opponent: One of their own, who 'dies' during the crossing, leading the
Azzies along the border in a diversion to let the others get through, then
comes back to hammer them to pieces, one by one, backed up by the best
firepower and cybernetics Aztechnology can dish out. In vanilla SR, I'd make
this guy a CyberZombie.
Complication: The Artifact has been recently transported to Tenochtitlan --
to a Universal Omnitech lab, because it may have some mystic properties
useful to The Blob (can't remember his name).

Mages:
Job: A fellow doctor/mage-type has disappeared, and favors are called in to
help track the guy down.
Opposition: A counter-circle of Aztechnology blood mages, who have kidnapped
the guy for mysterious reasons unknown. (Actually to use the above Artifact
to, hopefully, successfully move The Blob from his vats and into the body of
a host.)
Complication: Dr. Mage has been hidden, and his 'scent' is mixed up with a
magic item of peculiar power, i.e. the Artifact. The mages must project
together through the Metaplanes to locate and separate Dr. Mage from the
artifact. The Blood Mages will be on the Metaplanes as well, fighting the
characters every step of the way.

Deckers:
Job: An ex-runner-turned-corp decker has gotten sniffs of big, bad things
going on down Tenochtitlan way, and hires old friends from the shadows to
take a look for him.
Opposition: Aztechnology IC and, in this case, old hated rival Aztechnology
corp deckers. Potentially a number of other nosy deckers who want a piece of
the action.
Complication: Data points to gross, raw, evil human experimentation and
stuff at the UO labs; the question is, what do the characters do about it?
If they stay up to snuff, i.e. moral, they have to punch in and either stop
it, or else get enormous juicy tidbits that, when made public, will send UO
stock into the crapper and maybe force Aztechnology to publically (and maybe
lethally) divest themselves of the rat bastard Blob in UO who's doing it.

Samurai:
Job: Actually, these guys all either hired on or got kidnapped into one of
the Aztechnology Arena Death-Match things. Their job is to survive, win, and
take home a shitload of cash. Oh yeah -- and they don't get any guns to do
it with. Just native cyberware, swords, and their hands.
Opposition: Each other, and assorted other nasty samurai. Towards the end,
when they break out (yes, they're supposed to break out), a lot of UO guards.
The very worst of the opposition, though, is the Ringmaster; a Face sort of
guy, who in my game blew out the front window of a restaurant, had his goons
'escort' everyone else out, then sat down with two of the characters (the
main PC and one of the other PC's followers) and politely 'invited' them to
accompany him to the Games. As the PCs were unarmed, and they were faced
with a half-dozen AR barrels pointed at each of them, well, they agreed.
(GM's suggestion: make about a third of the samurai female, and at least one
of the NPCs a very nasty sort, and make all of them live in barracks-style
accomodations. Attempted (or successful) rape by said Nasty Samurai will
give you the opportunity -- presuming your PCs don't take care of some
'summary justice' -- to show you how ruthless and uncaring of their fates Mr.
Face can be. 'Woken from sleep, dressed in felt slippers and a silk
bathrobe, Mr. Face looks down at the kneeling, held Wannabe-Rapist. "For
attempted rape, two shocks. For trying to damage another fighter outside of
the ring, five shocks." Mr. Face scowls. "And for waking me up in the
middle of the night, twenty shocks." He waves one hand airily. "Carry
on.")
Complication: The winner of the death-matches is to go 'under the 'trodes'
and have his brain 'overwritten' by that of The Blob in the Tank. (Yeah,
okay, so I got the idea from that Emilio Estevez/Mick Jagger movie, I can't
remember the name. If your players DO remember the movie, and one of them --
preferably not the Main PC, but maybe one of the Supporting PCs -- goes
'under the 'trodes', feel free to let them try to bullshit their way out of
it, just like the movie. If you're feeling generous, make Mr. Face despise
his boss the Blob, and do the 'passcode' thing with the samurai.)

The climax is, of course, everyone blowing into the same area at the same
time. The last of the riggers are blowing their way through the halls with
drones, or maybe coming in via air or some such, with Aztlan's best trying to
shoot them down. The deckers are frantically throwing switches in the Matrix
to screw up the computer-assisted transferrence, hacking into the Blob's
tanks and trying to frag with him while black IC blows them apart one by one.
The mages come howling out of the Citadel, burning power by the bucketful to
interrupt the link between Dr. Mage, the Artifact, the Blob, and the Victim
while Blood Mages are blasting powerbolts after them. And, of course, the
Samurai are hacking their way through to cack the Evil Mastermind behind it
all, getting captured (or conned) into submitting to the ritual/putting the
'trodes on.

And if, in the end, you have done everything properly, you should have an
exhausted decker and a fried deck, a shot-up Rigger (who might be able to get
himself and the surviving Samurai -- and maybe Dr. Mage -- back out of
dodge), a slagged-out mage, and a shot-up Samurai with a lot of blood on her
sword. On the other side, though, maybe you'll have a slagged Artifact, The
Blob convulsing with a brain anyeurism, and a BS 'replacement' for the Blob
in the Supporting PC samurai. If the latter, hey, your PCs might have
friends in high -- very high -- places in Aztechnology...



The Wyrm Ouroboros
'Half Russian mathemetician,
half Silicon Valley code freak.'

Further Reading

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