So while G+ looks like it’s wrapping up, i was thinking maybe before we head towards heading to somewhere else we could close out with discussing our Urban Shadows playthroughs past and present to talk about the great stories we’ve built within the framework of the game.
To start us off, the game i’m GM’ing has a storm building which i’m excited for, because the intersection of events which resulted in it was not something i had expected.
Essentially, the game started off with a few rather basic plots in the part of the city most associated with the game’s Vessel, a clockwork automaton named Snipe. Snipe’s creator has been missing for years, but meanwhile she is still more or less programmed to protect the clocktower which was her creator’s home and workshop. This made the area around the tower a great place to hit with local threats, such as a lyncanthrope pack power struggle over how to contend with the additional threat of gentrification driven by a mysterious property developer.
Snipe and another PC Wizard named Vincent were pulled in by separate acquaintances with debts in order to clandestinely deal with the power struggle by assassinating the more violent contender Viscera on behalf of the other contender, an old wolf named Greywind. They agreed for the sake of ensuring stability in the area, and began hatching a plan.
The Wizard however, was discovered snooping around the junkyard serving as the base for Viscera and her gang, tipping them off that there might be powerful third parties involving themselves in the situation. The gang mobilized, calling in allies and favors, including another PC, a faerie named Deiralae.
Meanwhile, Snipe came under scrutiny by a metro police force worried enough about the situation to begin keeping an eye on the area’s most powerful figures. The detective tailing her however, picked the wrong time to do so, just as Snipe and Vincent’s operation was about to start in earnest. The detective was discovered by on gaurd lyncanthropes, and the resulting startled gunfire led to the entire pack mobilizing, nearly tearing the policeman and several pc’s apart.
Snipe however, had a nuclear option. She had gotten her more mindless automaton kin to agree to step in if she needed them to. Leading to essentially a swarm of metallic insects descending on and ripping apart the pack.
Viscera however, had been looking for Vincent instead, not present during the attack, leaving her hungry for revenge. Meanwhile, a metropolitan policeman is now lying nearly dead in the ICU, and not only has the goal Greywind intended for the pair not been completed, but his packmembers have been slaughtered by the “kin” of the ally he had sent out to do it. Now he has to declare war on the clocktower, not only for the deaths of those he had considered under his protection, but also out of shame for complicity in the deed. The police meanwhile, are likely to come down like a brutal authoritarian hammer on all involved. Even if they are in some way tempered, they don’t take kindly to one of their own being targetted. A war for the streets is brewing, and meanwhile the organization that helped stir the situation, is almost entirely unknown in their motivations. A storm to be sure.