We finally managed to get a game going. It took a while. Again. This doubles as my private notes of what was happening.
Dramatis Personae
* Misrule, a Haida Shaman
* Glimmer, a Haida Assassin
* Puppeteer, a Dwarven drone rigger
Rules were Shadowrun 3. This might have been a bit of an issue later on.
The shaman and the assassin in-game are sisters, which explains the presence of two Haida in a single group.
The PCs were recruited by some gangers coming up to them in their daily life. They were invited to Matchstick’s, a private club in Downtown, a 1920s speakeasy styled bar.
Inside they met Eve Donovan, a fixer all of them were at least fleetingly familiar with, who offered them lots of money for a good and quick job. Three days later, at exactly 2am, they were to steal a file kept in an isolated system inside the Cavilard Research Center in Bellevue. This needed to be synchronized with a job in the Philippines at the same time.
They received a map and some basic information. Matrix overwatch would be done by a NPC decker called Cypher, but he/she first needed access to the system.
A quick successful check got some information that a fleeting acquaintance of the assassin from her MCT days used to be the security director of the facility, before being fired for a rather embarrassing scandal (someone from the security company had used MCT computers to program a computer game).
They went on to investigate the facilities they were supposed to enter, the rigger using his roto-drone for some surveillance, the shaman astrally projecting to gain a lay of the land. Security was deemed sloppy, but they could not actually enter properly.
The acquaintance of the assassin was found, plans to kidnap him were squashed when they realized he had become a leading figure in an organ-legging gang in the Barrens, calling himself “Blood”.
(insert exasperated sighs from the players)
A meetup was requested via contacts.
In between they received more information from contacts in the metroplex government. There is a known issue with the security sensors on the lower levels, and one of the contacts had a reasonable layout of the sewers in Bellevue.
Their plan is now to infiltrate via spider drone and I will have to work that out more.
A meeting with Blood was performed and concluded successfully, leaving them in debt for a favor with Blood, but giving them access to a rough map of the building, and giving them some additional hints.
I have the feeling they are thinking of this whole thing a bit too lightly, and I will have to rework the scenario for next time so it won’t be a complete disaster. They completely missed out on one line of inquiry, which will lead to one news article about a murdered NPC they haven’t even met.
The use of the spider-drone might be an issue with the rules. It certainly is in the rules, but I think it would not have been available in 2050, when the game is set. They also were trying to investigate the building more in the astral than the author ever thought they would. Anyway, it helped that the security for the target really is not that great.
Next time…DEATH IN THE SEWERS! (probably)
Note: I took the chance and now am asking my players to name the session after the game.