How are you all making this feel Far future. What do you describe or handle the overall nature of the game.
How are you all making this feel Far future. What do you describe or handle the overall nature of the game.
Alright need some help parsing the text. Our Tech got a cyberdeck and is now a wannabe hacker.
Alright need some help parsing the text. Our Tech got a cyberdeck and is now a wannabe hacker.
Basically I’m trying to get a handle on alerts, alarms, and mission clocks. Here are some of the questions i’m wrestling with now:
1.) Now when shut down happens at 2100 the hacker can reverse this from the security node. But this does not necesarily move the mission clock back, right?
2.) When an IC triggers an alarm in an area it advances the mission clock and lets the system know where the hacker is. So when the hacker turns off an alarm does this reduce the mission clock? I’m seeing the possibility for a tug of war on the mission clock and its so radically different from the rest of my sprawl play, that I’m doubting whether i’m reading the rules right.
3.) Are physical alarms the same thing? If someone gets a 7-9 on a fast talk and lets the runners past but radios up to HQ… Can the hacker use a hold to reduce physical alarms and say that HQ doesn’t do anything and no clocks are advanced? I think part of my worry here is the npc guards are becoming increasingly like video game characters in that they’ll forget substantial evidence because the move says so. Or atleast i’m not seeing how the fiction works here.
4.) How would you ‘show approaching danger’ with a native User heading to the ROOT module to defend the matrix space? The hacker was in the Security module and I felt I didn’t know how to demonstrate the User going to ROOT, so instead the User went to the Security module to try to undo the damage. The User was ambushed and thrashed, which was fine but if I wanted a smarter User who went to the ROOT module how would the hacker be aware and fight against it? Is it just about moving fast to ROOT to stop the tampering? Or is it that the User can’t know where the hacker is without alarms?
I know these things might be handled differently at every table but I’m interested in how anyone else has handled these things.
This is my first time trying to write a custom move and could use some feedback.
This is my first time trying to write a custom move and could use some feedback. In my campaign, I’m going to have an antagonist come up who is a cyberware repo man who uses EMP rounds to disable cyberware without permanently damaging it. The idea is kinda based on how gel rounds work and forces a custom EMP Harm move instead of the normal Harm move.
EMP Rounds
EMP rounds are designed to jam and disable cyberware – a weapon loaded with EMP rounds inflicts EMP-harm instead of its listed harm value; targets harmed by EMP rounds add the original harm value to their roll when making the EMP harm move. Cyberware that has been insulated versus EMP reduces the harm inflicted by 2.
EMP Harm
When you suffer EMP harm, choose a piece of cyberware you have installed and roll EMP harm suffered.
7+: choose 1:
◽ The cyberware’s software is scrambled and starts malfunctioning wildly. Act Under Pressure whenever you try to use it.
◽ The cyberware BSODs and stops responding.
7-9: The effects of the EMP don’t last too long.
10+: The effects of the EMP last until you can get it repaired.
Does anybody know about a Shadowrun AddOn for The Sprawl?
Does anybody know about a Shadowrun AddOn for The Sprawl? I played Sixth World (DW Hack) but for a few reasons The Sprawl is just more consistent.
Synap Pistol
Synap Pistol
Also called a Ghandi Gun due to it’s non-lethal nature, the Synap Pistol is standard issue to all New Angeles Police Department officers. The weapon fires a burst of electromagnetic energy designed to disrupt an organic target’s nervous system, causing temporary paralysis and unconsciousness. As the charge also interferes with electrical systems, freezing some and forcing others to shut down, it is an effective weapon against robots and bioroids as well.
It is neither a subtle nor a long distance weapon, however. The bright blue bolts of electricity only have an effective range of ten meters, less if the effect is dispersed by rain or fog. Each shot is accompanied by a high decibel shrilling, affectionately referred to as a “banshee scream” by many officers. There is no way to fire a Synap Pistol and not alert everyone in the area to your presence. But that one shot should take down any target, organic or otherwise, unless its fully encased in an electromagnetically shielded suit of powered armor.
Synap Pistol
close, loud, ignore armor, non-lethal
When you’re hit with a Synap Pistol, roll+Meat. On a 10+, you’re unconscious and paralyzed for a few seconds. On a 7-9, you’ll come to in about a minute.
Do you have “Unspoken Directives”?
Do you have “Unspoken Directives”? Sort of campaign-wide truths that might be exploited to gain experience regardless of whether they are listed?
For instance, my players generally understand that these are always in play…
• If you find out your employer is doing something horrible, and you screw that up for them, mark XP. (and expect things to get interesting as that plays out.)
• If you screw things up for them in a way that they don’t realize it’s screwed up, and you can still technically finish the mission, mark another XP. (this is a rare reward for especially clever plans.)
Be gentle.
Be gentle. This is more of a proof of concept than anything else. It lacks supplemental stuff, like a tag list or mysteries list.
Instead of adding new stats, I chose to replicate the cyberware rules and how they limit access to moves like jack-in and second skin.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BxxLGqX8_53gUHU0YVZFMmcwOEk/view?usp=sharing
Shell Corps
Shell Corps
How would you handle several layers of shell corporations?
The session where I was going to run the Tannhäuser Job got pushed back. Which is good, as I’m still doing prep work. This is only our second mission, and will be the first where the employer is unknown to the players/characters. The Corp that has hired the team is a conglomerate, a collection of numerous smaller corps that all act somewhat independently, but who’s upper management all coordinate through a board of directors to avoid harming each other’s interests.
So what I’m wondering here is how to handle shell corporations. There are several layers of smaller corps between the characters and the Corp listed on the sheet. If the players want to dig into who’s really hired them how would they go about doing that?
I figure the PCs could go poking around the Database systems of the company the target owned (whom they’ve been hired to assassinate) or the first company that hires them (if they find that out). That could lead them to discover who owns each company in the chain, all the way up to the top. Of course each level up they go is going to be better defended.
How many layers is too many though? Too many shell corps to wade through and the players get bored. Too few and it seems like something anyone could have found.
Thoughts?
Question about intrigue in a mission…
Question about intrigue in a mission…
What are your practices regarding behind the scenes machinations as it pertains to your missions? When your PCs get the job, how up front with them are you about what’s going on and why they’re being hired to do this thing? If you incorporate a mystery, bit of intrigue, or ulterior motive, do you do so with the intentions of working it into the things the players discover during legwork/action phases or do you drop the initial plot thread during the Get The Job phase and leave it to the PCs to either pursue or not?
In the games I’ve run so far, I’m finding that my players aren’t getting engaged in my missions beyond the surface, which is making me unsure of myself regarding my approach to information divulgence.
It feels like they’re not latching onto the “truth” about what’s going on with the missions they’re being hired to do and I’m wondering if I shouldn’t start taking a different approach with how I’m prepping my games to either eliminate the extra work (thus resulting in missions that are what they say they are), or start finding a better way of putting these mystery nuggets in the direct path of what they decide to do so that they’re “discovering” the layers of the mission without the work.
Anyone else have any similar observations/obstacles with their own game groups regarding the art of mystery storytelling?
Are there any additional playbooks out there?
Are there any additional playbooks out there?