Digital Dark Age
| Digital Dark Age | |||||||||
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| Part of The Cutter's Curator | |||||||||
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| Factions Involved | |||||||||
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ShadowHaven Professor Simeon Jones | Cutters | ||||||||
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Charon Entropy Pell Rewired Toughie Tripp |
Cutters Mooks Cutters Lieutenant Cutters Conjurer Cutters Explorer Spirit of Air Spirit of Earth | ||||||||
| Casualties and losses | |||||||||
| Cutters Mooks x4, Cutters Explorer, Spirit of Air x3, Spirit of Earth | |||||||||
Summary
In which the runners are asked by Professor Simeon Jones to recover a time capsule from the old Microsoft(deck) campus in Redmond.
The Meet
Professor Jones asks the runners to meet with him at the Museum of 5th World Culture in Redmond; everyone is able to make it there without too much issue, though Tripp ends up needing to rush due to taking public transit into the district and a few of the other runners encounter gangland violence between the Ancients and the Cutters en-route. Arriving, they are greeted by the curator and shown to his office, being offered drinks and comfortable seats as he explains what he needs from them. Jones says he's located a time capsule that was buried on the old Microsoft campus in Redmond from before the first Crash; unfortunately, the Cutters are currently squatting there and using it as a fortified base. He asks that they do the job without provoking the Cutters to retaliate against him, as he really doesn't need more trouble from them, and offers them 8k nuyen each, and the team accepts without pushing for more.
The Plan
Using the museum as a base, the team plan out their approach. After a matrix search to find that the time capsule is burred underneath a large statue in a central courtyard, Rewired pilots a drone over the campus to spy it out and confirm that it's still there and give them a bird's eye view of the place. While there, he gets spotted out by the Cutters decker, who GBoGH's 3 marks onto it; Rewired is able to notice the marks in time to engage in cybercombat with him, managing to jack out before he's traced. With a bit of scouting done, Entropy and Trip project over for some astral scouting, with Charon joining them after taking shade for the first time. Together they spot out a trio of bound air spirits paroling the place, along with an explorer and a warded lodge. Judging that there are a good number of Cutters inside, they take a measure of their opponents strength while managing to not get noticed before returning to the group and sharing their findings. The team debate for a while on their tactics before settling on a plan of attack, such as it is.
The Run
Splitting up, half of the team (Charon, Pell and Toughie) approach the campus from the east side through a hole in the outer wall while the other half (Entropy, Rewired and Tripp) scale a building on the west side with a commanding view of the statue and the building the Cutters are in to use as an overwatch perch - each of them employ concealment and manage to be stealthy enough through teamworked tests to not be noticed by the gangers as they get into position, however Team A ends up spotted by the spirit patrol's strong assensing rolls due to the presence of a high-magic vampire and a channeler lighting up the astral. Initiative is rolled and combat ensues, with Charon and Toughie taking out the spirits and Pell taking down the explorer. While this happens, Entropy uses an extended sense enemies spell to locate over a dozen Cutters, and Rewired spots out the decker on the matrix in order to tag his icon and shoot him through the walls.
With Entropy and Tripp providing magical fire support, Toughie swords his way through Cutters mooks while Pell and Charon handle the newly-summoned earth spirit on the astral sent to stop them, all while dealing with suppressing fire from the building; Charon goes down from bullet overdose, but her regeneration doesn't care about lead poisoning and she gets right back up, going Super Sayan and activating state of purity only to immediately be put down by suppressive fire. Meanwhile, the B team is spotted out by the Cutters lieutenant, who has his sniper take pot-shots at them while he lobs grenades with his Ares Alpha. The first one gets tossed back by Entropy with a fling spell, causing them to run for their lives, but the gangers are experienced fighters and simply identify mages to geek. Rewired launches a volley of grenades into the building and jumps on the next one sent in his direction, ending up shot in the chest for his trouble.
Entropy, looking to end the fighting and achieve their objective, overcasts a levitation spell to rip the statue from its foundation and flings it into the building, giving Toughie and Charon (who by this point has regenerated again) cover to run over and remove the time capsule with the aid of Entropy's spirit; with Tripp's water spirit using concealment on them, Pell covers their escape with a ball lightning - this however makes her a target of the sniper who shoots her through the chest and nearly kills her, forcing her to drag herself away and heal herself. The distraction lets Entropy levitate himself, Rewired and Tripp down the side of the building and escape, meeting up with the others at Charon's genericar which they load the time capsule onto and drive off into the night (after leaving behind AR tags implying they were working on behalf of the Halloweeners).
Aftermath
Having barely escaped with their lives (and their intact quarry), the team return to Professor Jones with the news. He is obviously incised that the runners provoked the Cutters against his explicit instructions, however Charon manages to BS him into accepting it as a necessity of retrieving the capsule for him. When he opens it up, he finds a treasure trove of 5th world tech (lots of floppy disks and VCR tapes, plus cultural relics from the late 80s), mollifying him considerably and convincing him to give the runners their payment without badmouthing them to Mint and the rest of the shadow community.
Rewards
- 8k nuyen
- 8 karma
- 2 CDP
- -10 Cutters Reputation
- Optional Contact: Professor Simeon Jones, C3/L1 Museum Curator - 3 RVP or 6 CDP
- Optional Quality: Daredevil or Tough as Nails @ Chargen price (ONLY IF one also takes PSC: Thrill-Seeker or Force of Chaos)
Game Quotes
[Title Card] "The Team Pisses Off The Cutters" |
Player After Action Reports (AARs)
Pell
Well that was interesting. Also hadn't channeled that powerful of a spirit before, that felt distressingly great.
Tripp and Entropy need to stop being so cautious with their Combat magic if they're expected to fight.
Poor thing, I didn't think I really knew how much the pact would take out of it.
PS: Hope Babylon enjoyed the simsense recording.
Charon
I've lost count of how many times I should've died by now. I'm pretty sure I'm reaching triple digits. Is this what Ciaphas Cain always felt like, I wonder? I mean, minus the Impostor Syndrome. I know exactly where I'm at. Seems the folks at Cutters upgraded their shit since Crimes; here I thought this'd be a milk run and they actually put up a good fight. Note for self: fuck them up hard in the future just to prove a point.
...I'm pretty sure all the goodwill I once earned with Kevin is gone. Oh, well. Fuck gangers.
Entropy
Note to self. Don't always listen to the advice of a primal elemental. It doesn't go how they typically take it. That said: I learned that at the end of the day, use your enviroment to your advantage this run. Statue meet building. People inside building, meet statue. It works perfectly well in terms of the fear factor. Although the massive headache and mild nosebleed was incredibly unpleasent.
Either way I've learned time and time again, most people broker with bullets and not blades, bartering with lead and not steel.