Shadowrun - Other survivors and a ray of hope

The final instalment in the write up of the Shadowrun game I played in as a teen. Index here.

The game continued long after this, but I only wrote notes for these sessions.

~~~

By now, they were tired. They wanted to get back to the others to warn them about the drones and possible security risks. Drazen cut through the wall in hope to lose any pursuers. A medusa attacked them. Again, they were lucky to get away before the explosion.

An office slightly further down also had blood smeared across it, leading out the front. Drazen stuck his head out quickly to see where it led, and noticed guards exiting the lift. They ran down the offices in a slight panic. A medusa jumped from the ceiling at them, but 3 people appeared and laid into it with sticks. One was killed outright by the metal beast, but it was destroyed with Maya and Drazen's help.

They were pulled into the ceiling and held there in silence as guards and drones passed beneath them, heading towards the hot dog warehouse the others were fortified in. Once the danger had passed, Maya and Drazen insisted on rescuing their friends, whilst Dave, an ex-candy floss seller, and Renneck, a dwarf who had been Christmas shopping, waited in the roof panels. Between the group, all the security was killed, and Dave and Renneck led them into the ceilings. Jaz was still in no condition to be moved far, so Tark and Ryan stayed with her as the others were led through the air vents and similar shafts to the others in the small band of survivor. Cal, an office first aider, reluctantly attempted to patch up Keneda, the worst off of the group. A small girl called Mel, and an old woman known as 'Gran' also sheltered by the large fan in the freezing tunnels.

Meanwhile, a Medusa had discovered Ryan and had pulled him through the ceiling to the ground. Tark destroyed it with a spell, and Ryan and Jaz miraculously survived the ensuing explosion. As soon as Maya heard it, she insisted they returned. A stretcher was improvised from Keneda's climbing gear, and the Colonel agreed to carry her. Ryan was also fairly messed up again.

Back in the larger area the survivors lived, talk again was turning to escape. Mel offered to take Jaz's place as decker, but it was deemed too dangerous for her. Dave offered to lead Keneda, Maya, Tark and Drazen towards the monorail station, as Maya and Drazen (not pleased that Ryn had turned himself invisible and returned to the others without sending help) had heard explosions from that direction. Gryn, the man who'd been killed rescuing them, had been the only one who really knew the tunnels, but the path was fairly straightforward.

The going was slow, but a plan was formed: Tark and Ryn summoned lots of weak spirits, then Ryn turned the Colonel, Drazen and Maya invisible. Renneck threw grenades from an air vent into a security office whilst Tark cast an illusion of a group of shadowrunners running a different route to the one taken by the invisible people. Keneda shot anyone who came close to the illusion. The Colonel got the 3 into the monorail tunnel as a mage saw through Tark's illusion, and everything turned towards the 2 hidden in the air vents. A spirit, whose master was killed in astral combat by Tark, removed the invisibility spell from the Colonel, who was killed medusas in the tunnel, as Drazen and Maya sprayed bullets into the few blue-eyed guards at the end, by the hole they planned to escape through, and the spinning dervishes, medusas and spider drones surrounding them. Once the Colonel was dead, Drazen became visible. Droids started to attack him. Maya shot some as she ran to the exit, providing him with the chance to win, but she became visible and was also attacked. Drazen came to her rescue, and they bundled through the hole in the wall.

They were outside the arcology, but far from safe.

Shadowrun - Blood Boil

This is the third instalment of my write-up of the Shadowrun game I played in many years ago, copied from scrappy notes I rediscovered when we moved last. I've tried to type the notes exactly as they're written, but have added paragraph breaks.

Again, it skates over some pretty graphic violence in places - including dead children. These days, when I write up games I try to include some of the character emotion, but for some reason I didn't when I wrote these. I certainly felt the emotion, but didn't record them. Maybe as a teenager I was embarrassed by them, or maybe I didn't know how to write them. Either way, I regret it now. 

(Index here)

~~~

The hot-dog warehouse became temporary base of operations. Wounds were healed, and there was time to initiate for Maya & Drazen/Tark.

Discussions between Ryan, Tark and Maya led them to believe Jaz and Drazen were the only people left alive they could trust with their lives - The Colonel being too unknown, Ryn seemed to be there for Ryan's money and Keneda had already abandoned his best friend. Drazen had become a bit stressed and slightly trigger happy - a kid's body in the corridor was testimony to that (though at the time everyone had agreed to let him shoot - & he felt guiltier than anyone else), but he had given Maya his spare gun and half his ammo, so it was decided to let them join the group and share group karma.

It was Tark's turn to go astral, so Ryan went to talk to Jaz while Maya settled Tark onto the sofa before seeking out Drazen. Jaz was pleased to be asked, though a little hesitant about Drazen. Maya came to talk to him whilst he guarded the hole. He, too, was more than happy to join, and shared Maya's philosophy of 'geek the elf' (though maybe for slightly different reasons. She considered Keneda a disgrace to her species and unsafe. Drazen hated him). He also explained about his history with Razor-Boy - about how he'd agreed to kill a family he knew were innocent farmers rather than the evil anarchists Mitsohama claimed. About his subsequent guilt at discovering one had survived, how he left Mitsohama to help Razor-Boy find a place in the Barrens and his guilt at never admitting to being the killer of his family & how he felt he hadn't helped enough.

Hours passed. Ryan felt better, but still not fantastic. Jaz wanted to take a small party to see if she could jack into the Matrix for some information. Ryan still wasn't up to much, and someone from the group, she & Maya agreed, ought to stay with him. Neither wanted to take 'the elf', so he was left as guard. Maya felt keeping Drazen from Keneda would be a good plan, leaving Tark with Ryan. They took Ryn as they wanted some magic protection.

A route to security offices was planned through other offices, but they had barely started when 2 'bumblebee' drones attacked. Jaz was hit, but felt ok. Maya felt very proud when she managed to destroy both with he bare hands. They headed off again, but after only metres Jaz suddenly felt ill... both Ryn and Maya attempted emergency first aid before she fell into a coma. Drazen grabbed the small body and they ran back to the others, where Tark and Ryan laid her down and tried to improve her condition. She had 'blood boil' - the thing which had killed Ranark. It would take 30 days of constant attention and little movement for her to recover.

The group was disheartened, but determined to do something. They decided to go 'foraging' - search for supplies or a possible escape route - and other survivors.

They checked the monorail tube, and both Drazen and Maya spotted the hatchways at regular intervals along. At the far end, Maya could just make out some people, dressed in black, climbing from one. A group of red samurai appeared as the 3 headed towards the black-ops guys. The leader was shot through the head as they reached SMG range. In the ensuing gun and mana-bolt fight, the remaining black-ops people and all the red samurai were killed. Ryn was seriously injured, and instructed to watch from an office to warn Maya & Drazen of any danger whilst they looted the bodies. A medusa headed towards Ryn, but Drazen killed it as Maya took an assault rifle and ammo for The Colonel. With Drazen, they found another Ingram Amsartgun so Drazen could replace the one given to Maya, and SMG bullets, as well as Red Sam Katana, a med-kit and an open comm-link. All Samurai had cyber-blue eyes. A shock was in store: the black-ops were Renraku...

Manta-type flying drones were patrolling overhead, so they lay amongst the bodies until the danger passed before continuing with the looting. A nearby lift arrived. 4 people with gren cybereyes surrounded by the spider-like cleaning dones stooed in it. The drones approached the 2 adepts. Maya tried to blag something out of the civilians when Drazen opened fire on the drones. The lift and 4 people left as the drones were hacked to pieces, Maya receiving a couple of light wounds.

They headed towards the offices to move along and find Ryn. The first few were completely empty, but the 4th contained spider-drones packing away everything in it. The drones informed them the facility was not ready. They apologised whe it added "Not blue. Not green. Not white. Processing." They reached the next office before it broke into "Security breach. Security breach." They ran.

Later, they found a dying man. Maya tried to patch him up, but he was too far gone for her medical experience. He had also been attacked by the spiders for the same colours... He died.

Further along, a trail of blood led them to hope they'd found Ryn. In fact, an ork child of about 6 sat cradling her dead mother's head in her lap and an exploded spider beside her. Maya managed to stabalise her, but when she tried to lift the heavy girl, she slipped and the ork died. "Welcome to the kid killing club" said Drazen. It was comforting, in a strange way.

Shadowrun - Trapped!

This is the second instalment of my write-up of the Shadowrun game I played in many years ago, copied from scrappy notes I rediscovered when we moved last.

The notes are particularly chaotic in a few places here, with arrows and footnotes and all sorts, and apparently I forgot about paragraphs... I left the last session with my character, Kamaya, and her NPC friend Tark taken captive at the Renraku Arcology. Fortunately, other of their friends escaped... (This session is a lot more violent than the previous.)

(Index here)

~~~

Ryan, meanwhile, contacted Ryn, Drazen, Razor-Boy, Jaz and Grinder (he offered them money - only Ryn agreed). They tricked Keneda into helping them (& Ranark) back into the Arcology as a rescue party. Keneda was going with The Colonel, Alastair, Stine and O'Lea to find room 1835 to get the money from Dunkelzahn's Will. Whilst preparing, the Arcology shut down. Using the Ork underground, they got into the basement and took a lift to the 6th floor - where Tark & Maya were marched into them. Ryan's team came running over, whilst Ranark & possibly Alastair were killed (Keneda's fault). The others ran from the various robots chasing them. At the end of the corridor, they started to blow up walls to make a passage. The civilians they met understandably panicked but started to calm down as they tried to explain. Using Tark to check astrally (O'Lea being unconscious), they found a child in a room beside them, so were more careful when demolishing the wall. Ryan passed through to calm the boy, and send him to the other civilians. As he passed the others, he detonated a grenade. They were lucky to survive. An argument ensued - Tark, Maya, Razor-Boy & Drazen wanted out, ASAP. Keneda, The Colonel & Stone wanted to check out the 18th floor, and said Ryan owed them. Reluctantly, they agreed to use Ryan & Jaz's expertise to control the lifts and travel to floor 18, then go. Keneda, The Colonel & Stone (still carrying O'Lea) got out, only for O'Lea to have her head blown off,followed by Razor-Boy's and then Stone's. No one was in sight, but the lighting was dimmed and a sound of children's voices, mocking and threatening, came over all the speakers. Ryan and Jaz started to move the lift away. Keneda jumped in, but the lift had to be stopped for The Colonel. Carefully, they returned to the basement, and were set upon by cleaning spider drones & an automated assault rifle. Their planned escape route had been covered. Droids, like spinning tops, that had attacked earlier started to head in, so they ran back to the lift and headed for the 3rd floor, hoping to escape via the monorail.

Tark and Maya took the lead, and were the first to spot a group of 7 red samurai. They ran back to the others, followed by shouts of "Step out with your weapons on the floor" and so forth. Another squabble followed, and Ryan walked out to buy more time. He tried to reason with the red sam, and was a little surprised to see they all had blue cybereyes, even the mage. Keneda tried to sneak out in his stealth suit whilst Maya, Tark & Drazen argued the argued the pro's and con's of walking out. Grinder took up position of leader and walked out to the samurai leader. 3 panther-like Medusa drones appeared as back-up, but the red sam seemed to have control over them. When Grinder realised his attempts at compromise were failing, he sent a message across the comm-link to Ryan: "Get Down." He detonated all his remaining explosives, killing all the red sam and two of the medusas. Ryan and Keneda were wounded, but survived. The floor and ceiling had holes large enough to climb through. The shock knocked Tark, Drazen and Jaz to the floor. Maya was helping Tark up as the remaining medusa started moving in on Keneda. Ryn was fast enough to put a physical barrier spell around it before it got too close. As Tark struggled to destroy it with magic, Ryan went closer to try and see how it worked. A bolt of electricity knocked him unconscious. Tark's spell succeeded in destroying it in time for Maya to identify howls as those of bargeists. Too far to be doing any harm, but getting closer. The Colonel grabbed Ryan and they ran, Ryn's spell and Drazen's guns taking out the dog-like creatures following. Jaz started to fall behind, so The Colonel carried her too. They ran into 2 bargeists waiting in ambush, but Tark's claws made short work of them. A panicked run through a shop into offices, and the 3 in front (Keneda, Tark, and Maya) were attacked by another medusa. Once it was trashed, Keneda noticed a flashing red light... They had time to duck back and so avoid the worst of the blast before it exploded, creating a hole into the warehouse behind. 

#RPGaDay2018: Day 4 - Most Memorable NPC

There's a lot of NPC's in my current stable of games who are definitely memorable, but hard to say which will prove to be most memorable (though The Emissary's theme song does make him stand out somewhat). Instead of picking any of them, I've reached back through the games I've played, trying to remember NPC's who stand out, and I think I'm going to choose Tark from the ShadowRun game I've recently started writing up. It was a close call between him and Drazen, or possibly Jaz, as it's a good 15 years or more since I played, but I still remember the 3 fondly. I've picked Tark, though, because his death shook me up.

The game had been running for a while when I joined, so the NPC's were already embedded. My character, Kamaya, was a speedfreak adept, making her very similar to Drazen. Tark was a shaman. I think I was the only magic player character, and they were the two magic NPC's who most frequently assisted on runs. Drazen was pretty callous, with a disregard for human life, and it ended up rubbing off on Kamaya (because I was young and impressionable and forgot she'd started out disliking killing), and Tark, with Wolf as his Totem, followed his pack, so most runs were pretty bloody.

It's no spoiler to tell you about Tark's death; it happened long after my notes finish.

Several of the trio's early runs were against Ares, until they ended up with a bit of a reputation as being the runners you wanted on your team if that's who your target was. Of course, this got them onto Ares radar, though I was too young and naive to realise it was a risk. Tark went missing for a while - I assumed he was on some kind of shamanic retreat, so had Kamaya react accordingly and not worry about him. Until he showed up, walking up the stairs of the restaurant/club she'd just bought (I was working to retire the character because she'd become so powerful). Ares had taken him and inserted a cranial bomb that they'd detonate if they didn't come with him.

He refused to let them come with him, and Kamaya was too shocked to argue.

His brains splattered the walls. 

I learnt a lot about the game world, and gaming, and even GM'ing (if I had a young, inexperienced player in the group, I hope I'd give a better indication that she might want to be more suspicious!) Part of me still misses Tark. He was a good mentor for Kamaya, sweet natured beneath it all. 

If you're taking part, don't forget to add a link to your response in the comments :) 

Shadowrun - Before the Arcology

This is the first installment of the write up of notes from the first RPG I ever played where we weren't playing ourselves in our local area. I'm typing them as they are, which means they may not be fully coherent (I wrote them a long time ago and they don't include much explanation of terms from the game nor any explanation of who the characters are - and I don't remember now!) If you're familiar with my write ups, you'll know they're usually first person: these aren't. Index here.

~~~

1st run in Seattle. Darius Delmar contacted Kamaya & she met the Johnson in a pub with Ryan, Drazen, Razer-boy & Tark. They carried out a small run against Ares, getting a decker (Jaz) in & out, with time for her to recover some data. This data was used to set up a run for Tark, Ryan & Maya, as they call her. A bugs nest was discovered on Ares property, which they helped expose with Kent Ludbecker and his orc cameraman, Wayne. Insider trading earnt the Seattle Yaks, and consequently them, a lot of cred. The mission led to them developing goup karma.

After that was a run against a Yak-owned building. The team - Ryn, Lucifer & a heavily-cybered troll - did not meet her expectations, and she almost turned the job down. Instead, she let them provide a distraction whilst she, Tark and Jaz snuck in, aided by their contacts amongst the SeattleYaks (not fans of the Yaks being targetted). The troll died; Ryn and Luce were heavily injured. Jaz took control of the building; Tark turned Maya invisible and she snuck around, stole computers and successfully extracted 3 scientists. No one was killed: the people she came across were stunned instead. When Maya discovered the warehouse built new BTL chips, she trashed the machinery before returning. Calling in a final favour from Honzo, Tark saved the lives of Ryn and Luce, though admitted Luce was the killer of Honzo's nephew.

Her next run was a data rescue. Keneda, Ryan, Ryn and Tark helped, mostly with invisibility spells from the shaman and data recording from Keneda and Ryan. Maya's job was to knock the people officially there unconscious.

One of Tark's fellow wolf-shaman, Ranark, wanted help. Whilst setting up this run, Tark & Maya set up a magic group, allowing Maya to initiate. Ranark wanted them to rescue his ex from the new Renraku arcology. Ryan, Ranark & Diane Grayson, the target, got out safely, but Tark and Maya were trapped. The cat-shaman, brought to cast a bulletproof shield, was killed. Maya surrendered, forcing Tark to do the same. They were marched around, weapons taken, watched astrally & physically, and interrogated amidst some confusion.

~~~

And that seems a good place to break for now. Although this was short (less than the first of the 4 sides of A4), the rest takes place in the Arcology (with more detail in the action, but no better clue as to who anyone is...)

My First Shadowrun Campaign - an introduction

While sorting through boxes now we've moved in, I found a load of writing from when I was a teenager. Most of it's angsty poetry and doodles from lessons (I found doodling helped me concentrate and recall, and most of my teachers were sympathetic to that), but I did find a did find 4 and a bit sides of A4 in my tiny, spider's handwriting: the Shadowrun game that was my first exposure to serious roleplay, from Kamaya's first run, to Kamaya and Drazen's initial taste of freedom after being trapped in the Renraku Arcology (a location I'd love to revisit one day, seeing as we didn't find any of its secrets...). Mostly it's the Arcology.

I wrote the notes in one sitting, so they're a bit garbled. Suspect I intended to write more of the game up later, and I didn't bother giving any character description because I knew them all... With that in mind, here's a brief overview of all the characters (as far as I can remember them):

Player Characters

Kamaya/Maya: my character. An elf adept (later shaman-adept, with Cheetah totem), with guns, speedfreakness and monofilament whip. Canadian by birth - half-Native American, half-Japanese (I wasn't familiar with the idea of meta/power gaming back then, so didn't see anything wrong with that, and wanted all the languages!) Parents and elder brother human. Idolised her elder brother, who taught her to shoot and use a whip before becoming addicted to BTL ('Better than Life') chips and eventually dying. She tracked down those who got him addicted and killed them, then came to Seattle to try and rebuild a life. Has a thin scar across her nose from a failure whilst learning to use her whip.

Ryan: male dwarf techie played by a guy called Andy. Had the 'combat paralysis' flaw.

Razer-Boy: male orc played by a guy called Paul. Guns and cyberware. 

Non-Player Characters
Drazen: male human adept. Very similar build to Kamaya.

Tark:male human wolf-totem shaman.

Jaz: female dwarf decker.

I can't remember the rest of the characters mentioned in the notes, even who the other players were! (There was a guy called Dave and I really can't remember his character, and someone called Ian but I think he joined later. Miriam definitely did. Can't remember if Owen played in the game or not).

The GM was a guy called Tom. Paul, Andy and I were the most consistent players - the others would come when they could/wanted to (probably why I can't remember who they were!) The game was 3rd Ed and set in Seattle.

I'll type up my notes over a few posts, fixing spelling/grammar errors but otherwise leaving exactly as they are (which might be interesting: I've not read through them so I don't know if they make sense). 

(I also want to write up Chrissie and Adam's Aberrant Eruption, as that's still not been told, and catch up both Deadlands and Exalted to the current state of play - and at some point start telling you about Mage!)