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Message no. 1
From: Merlin Montgomery <merlin.montgomery@********.OTAGO.AC.NZ>
Subject: Traitorous Johnsons.
Date: Mon, 14 Aug 1995 17:51:24 +1200
>>Heres another one, why is it that in almost every
>>FASA module for Shadowrun, the "Johnsons" turn against the PC's. Don't
you
>>think that the PC's would learn that if it's an official Shadowrun Module,
>>not to take the job, or ask for a hell of a lot more money than the
>>Johnson's are offering.
>
True - it's either turn traitor on the characters, or Mr. Johnson
dies, so: "sorry, no nuyen this time chummers, Johnson's superiors have
decided he was a waste of space." (which is why we always try to get at
least half the fee up front!)
Actually, it often turns out that way in home grown adventures too,
now that I think about it - I've killed off the Johnson more than once. Is
it just the GM trying to make the adventure more twisty and baffling or is
it something more... sinister. :)
Thinking of the published adventures I've played, Johnson either
dies, lies or backstabs the players in:
MINOR SPOILER WARNING (IN CASE YOU DONT' WANT TO KNOW)













Total Eclipse (as has been said). God I hated that "adventure".
Bottled Demon (Johnson dies in first encounter)
Dragon Hunt (you get a consolation payout, but Johnson isn't what you think
and you can't "win")
and
Mercurial (Max gets toasted. "Am I right?")

This is just four from memory. Why does this happen? As Gurth said,
you'd pretty sharpish stop working for corps that regularly fail to pay
out, or kill their own guys. But hey, what can ya do?
Later
Merlin.

---
merlin.montgomery@********.otago.ac.nz

**** STYLE OVER SUBSTANCE ****
**** ATTITUDE IS EVERYTHING ****
**** TAKE IT TO THE EDGE ****
**** AIN'T NEVER GONNA DIE FOR WANT OF SHOOTING BACK ****
Message no. 2
From: Damion Milliken <adm82@***.EDU.AU>
Subject: Re: Traitorous Johnsons.
Date: Wed, 16 Aug 1995 15:04:19 +1000
Merlin Montgomery writes:

> True - it's either turn traitor on the characters, or Mr. Johnson
> dies, so: "sorry, no nuyen this time chummers, Johnson's superiors have
> decided he was a waste of space." (which is why we always try to get at
> least half the fee up front!)

Well, sometimes that happens, but I don't think it's _all_ that common in
written adventures. The FASA published modules always abide by the following
formula as far as I've seen:

Runners hired for pretty simple job
Pretty simple job has rather unexpected attatchements
Runners don't get paid for extra attatchments (usually)

It's almost possible to guarantee that a printed module will have an awful
lot more to it than it seems at the start. My players tend to think to
themselves when being offered a job "Hmmm, he says easy job, no more than
a day, cakewalk, 5000-10000 nuyen...LIKELY", then promptly demand three
times the nuyen to cover the sure to come unexpected eventualities. I'm
throwing in a few simple runs with no (obvious) 'forced' extras, just to
show them that such a thing does exist. (I admit, my runs tend to have just
a few of these attatchments with them too most of the time, so the players
have come to expect them.) I'd say that the Johnson in FASA runs dies about
as often as he betrays the runners.

--
Damion Milliken University of Wollongong E-mail: adm82@***.edu.au

(GEEK CODE 2.1) GE -d+@ H s++:-- !g p0 !au a19 w+ v(?) C++ US++>+++ P+ L !3
E? N K- W M@ !V po@ Y+ t+ 5 !j R+(++) G(+)('''') !tv(--@)
b++ D B? e+$ u@ h* f+ !r n----(--)@ !y+
Message no. 3
From: Sascha Pabst <Sascha.Pabst@****.INFORMATIK.UNI-OLDENBURG.DE>
Subject: Re: Traitorous Johnsons.
Date: Wed, 16 Aug 1995 20:30:43 +0200
Damion Milliken wrote:
> The FASA published modules always abide by the following
> formula as far as I've seen:
>
> Runners hired for pretty simple job
> Pretty simple job has rather unexpected attatchements
> Runners don't get paid for extra attatchments (usually)
>
> It's almost possible to guarantee that a printed module will have an awful
> lot more to it than it seems at the start. My players tend to think to
> themselves when being offered a job "Hmmm, he says easy job, no more than
> a day, cakewalk, 5000-10000 nuyen...LIKELY", then promptly demand three
> times the nuyen to cover the sure to come unexpected eventualities. I'm
> throwing in a few simple runs with no (obvious) 'forced' extras, just to
> show them that such a thing does exist.
Yeah, that's about the meanest thing to do to a group...No special gimmick,
no second plot, no betrayal... and see a bunch of shaking 'Runners glacing
around madly and paranoid.... :-)
Sascha
Message no. 4
From: Mark Steedman <RSMS@******.EEE.RGU.AC.UK>
Subject: Re: Traitorous Johnsons.
Date: Thu, 17 Aug 1995 08:49:53 GMT
> From: Sascha Pabst <Sascha.Pabst@****.INFORMATIK.UNI-OLDENBURG.DE>
> Damion Milliken wrote:
> > The FASA published modules always abide by the following
> > formula as far as I've seen:
> >
> > Runners hired for pretty simple job
> > Pretty simple job has rather unexpected attatchements
> > Runners don't get paid for extra attatchments (usually)
> >
> Yeah, that's about the meanest thing to do to a group...No special gimmick,
> no second plot, no betrayal... and see a bunch of shaking 'Runners glacing
> around madly and paranoid.... :-)
> Sascha
>
Not every FASA run is like that of course, but. Then of course you
get to the Two FASA cakewalks, where the above is exactly what you
should be doing. 'Digging your own graves', and 'six feet under', You
either know, or don't want to know which book these two are in. Ok
you don't get crossed for the following main event, it would just
help if Johnson was not blackmailing you with AAA Corps and bothered
to tell you quite what you are walking into. (though he doesn't know
the details of course).

Mark
Message no. 5
From: Gurth <gurth@******.NL>
Subject: Re: Traitorous Johnsons.
Date: Thu, 17 Aug 1995 10:16:44 +0200
>Yeah, that's about the meanest thing to do to a group...No special gimmick,
>no second plot, no betrayal... and see a bunch of shaking 'Runners glacing
>around madly and paranoid.... :-)

Reminds me of an episode of MASH I saw last week... It might be real cool to
pull on a group of runners, see them imagine all sorts of things that aren't
there, and then let the outside world react to the runners as if it were all
true :)

--
Gurth@******.nl - Gurth@***.nl - http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/index.html
tattooed everything
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t(+) 5 X R+++>$ tv+(++) b+@ DI? D+ G++ e h! !r(--) y? Unofficial Shadowrun
Guru :)

Further Reading

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