I'm full of bad ideas
| I'm full of bad ideas | |||||||||
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| Factions Involved | |||||||||
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ShadowHaven Halloweeners | Cutters | ||||||||
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Ryan Danes Bulldozer WildCat Rurosha |
Character1 Character2 | ||||||||
| Casualties and losses | |||||||||
| 10 Halloweener Cybertank Sams | 14 Gang Street Sams | ||||||||
Summary
Mr. Johnson wants a new location to base their fixer operations out of in Seattle, Runners are brought in to provide such a location, they then proceed to start a gang war to clear the space out for them.
Background
The Meet
The meet took place in an utterly filthy building which might have once passed for an apartment complex, decaying tiles, creaking stairs, and all the windows being boarded up were not a promising sign. The party quickly met up and recognized the obvious getup of a group of shadowrunners and made their way inside after packing a few 'insurance cards' in the form of concealed weapons and drones. A few of the more-astute members of the party were able to quickly spot the Johnson milling at the end of the hall, a deeper, matrix-involved search showing a series of dark, glitchy spirits surrounding him until the group approached. After a sidetrack in the form of a malfunctioning, ancient printer which M3chan1c was able to assist the struggling maintenance worker with, they were welcomed inside a nearby room by Johnson, revealing a hidden room far more fitting to a high-tech fixer than this dingy building they found themselves within.
Johnson was rather open with the job, they had a series of locations they were interested in setting up shop at all throughout the city, and it was up to the runners to determine which one that would be. One problem, the locations were currently inhabited by several gangs, the Yakuza, the Ancients, the Cutters, and a group of the 162s. According to Mr. Johnson, these fringe factions which called the potential safe houses home were connected to their organizations by a mere thread, any sort of action taken against them on this day would have negligible consequences, if any at all. With little faith in his runners, Johnson explained that he would gladly pay each of the runners an amount to the tune of 12,000 Nuyen for the job, the rest of his dedicated funds going towards the inevitable repairs that would have to be made to his new establishment after they were done with it. After some back-and-forth between the runners and the up-and-comer, they failed to negotiate any better terms in exchange for a less-damaging plan to take the location, it was explained that the location needed to remain structurally sound after its occupants were cleared out, especially the basement. As the party discussed the potential civilian presences, mage threats, and cybered-out troll risks of each gang target, the group was startled by a shot firing off from the door they had just passed through.
Poking through the door, the group was met with a twitching and spasming orc laying on the floor before them, with a twin set of taser prods sticking out of their chest from the door-mounted taser, damn eavesdroppers. With a short 'pity-kick' from the rigger and a hefty toss onto a nearby bench from Bulldozer, the group gladly made their way out to their vehicles, ready for their 'housewarming party.'
The Plan
Looking over the given locations and gangs involved with the list of potential targets from the Johnson, the party determined that the best fit for their attack would be the Cutters, as M3chan1c had previously fought with them and all runners, save for Bulldozer, instantly vetoed the idea of going after the Yakuza in any capacity... or the Ancients and their mages, as the mostly-mundane party was understandably skittish about such a prospect.
After a few short matrix searches, the group was able to look over the history of the location, nabbing some information of the previous occupants and the neighbors, including a rather nasty haven of Elder God Mages, a rather inconspicuous, multi-story parking garage across the street, and a small, single-occupant Knight Errant booth down the road, saved for the lowest ranking member on the force's totem pole that week, nothing major to get in the way for the runners. Mounting up on the upper level of the parking garage, the party scoped out the Cutter bar, apparently, there were very few civilians in this location, as the gang members would usually rough up and toss out anybody that wasn't one of them, or happened to annoy them that day, giving them a rather negative reputation in the neighborhood. With this information in mind, M3chan1c pulled Bulldozer aside, hoping to take advantage of his more-expansive knowledge of gang behavior in Seattle. According to the Street Sam, the Cutters were rather sore enemies of the Halloweeners, the two gangs regularly getting into skirmishes throughout the streets. With some matrix trickery, AR design knowledge, and an obnoxious exploitation of social media and advertising networking, a massive invitation was spammed out to as many people as possible, detailing a Halloween party going on right at their target location. As the party looked over the replies, the number of clown-faced profiles sending death threats, insults, and promises of a hilarious, flaming destruction seemed rather promising, a good excuse to trim down enemy numbers.
As it stood, the runners spoke and decided that the best plan forward would be to let the gangs fight it out, then mop up whoever was left in the end, grabbing their weapons and anything to get a better view of the situation, M3chan1c decided once again to drop into the Matrix for a quick sprint through the poorly-maintained host. After force-rebooting and reading through some messages on the poorly-treated Spider's deck to get their attention, he gave them a cryptic warning to leave immediately before the clowns arrived, and to not tell anyone, with a short wave from their icon, the Spider gladly disabled the host's security system before pushing their way out of the building, leaving M3chan1c to gladly jack into their security system and pull up AR screens of every last angle of the bar for the runners, giving them a front row seat to the show as he displayed the list of all Cutters in attendance, as well as their weapons, a perfect way to ensure the location was thoroughly cleared out.
As an invite to join a nearby live stream showed up, with a rather obvious clown motif as the thumbnail, the party tuned in and got ready to watch the pyrotechnics.
The Run
The live stream was something else, live-feed coverage of an imminent gang war, broadcasted by the invaders, and even hosted by a rather talkative showboat of a Halloweener, the very driver of the assault vehicle.
The vehicle in question was a morbid, but still awe-inspiring, twist of scrap metal, barbed wire, and old emplacement guns, unofficially dubbed 'the battle bus,' it was like something out of the old wasteland trids that used to be popular. As the speakers on the the battle bus began to blare with a combination of thematically appropriate music, as well as mechanical clown laughter, the Cutters made their first move. The moment the clowns came to a stop, one of the 'heavy hitting' trolls from the Cutters popped over the rooftop with an anti-vehicle launcher, though, as the rocket fired off, it only made half of its trajectory before it was intercepted by a knife, whipped up from obviously adept Halloweener hanging off of the front of the vehicle, triggering another round of hysterics from the clown behind the loudspeakers.
The Cutters then attempted to counter-attack from the ground floor, the attempt at covering fire from the defenders immediately being cut off by an even heavier suppressing fire, in the literal sense, thanks to the mounted flamethrower on top of the vehicle. As a pair of Cutters continued through the onslaught, decked out in some rather serious-looking armor, the turret gunner simply swapped to a tank of acid and continued to hose them down. As the tanks weathered the approach, a flurry of Cutters poured out in an attempt to flank their attackers, earning some praise from the stream's host, before the brave orc covered in glowing tattoos and wielding a magically-glowing claymore took a dagger to the temple and collapsed into a twitching heap, the rest of the counter assault going up in flames.
Wanting to end things, the Halloweeners finally made their main assault, releasing a swarm of 10 cybered-up gang members built nearly as heavily as the bus they rode in on, as they began to approach the building, they were met with the last of the defenders, the troll who had originally fired the rocket from up top, with a bellowing battle cry, he charged into the attackers with some sort of grenade, priming it at the last second, he slammed his fist, clenching the explosive tightly within, into the jaw of the closest tank soldier, instantly disappearing into a blinding white flash along with the rest of the assault team, leaving behind the remainder of the bus gangers to watch in awe of the incredible display as the battle finally ceased.
Aftermath
After watching the clowns finish up their first act of comical destruction and drive off to who knows where, the runners called up Johnson, earning a rather apprehensive 'what did you do?' before they rather proudly explained the situation at hand, sending in a few drones to the bar to nab some choice bottles of celebratory whiskey, the group had a toast to a job well done as the client in question rolled up, seeming somewhat annoyed with the smell of burnt flesh and odd sounds of clown-based destruction in the distance, he quietly opened up a secret compartment to the basement, surprising both the runners, and the Cutter Spider who poked his head in through the door, just in time to earn himself a job as a 'minion' to Mr. Johnson in his new endeavors. With some formalities about the location and the events of the job out of the way, Mr. Johnson gladly paid the good runners and sent them out on their way.
Rewards
12k (6 RVP)
7 Karma (7 RVP)
2 CDP
optional
Ronin Koike 1/3 (3 RVP) Koike the technoshaman Fixer.
Sneaky Rabbit 1/3 (3 RVP) Former Cutter Spider
Game Quotes
Merpkiller: "That's it, I'm pulling out the whiskey for this run."
Toaster: "Oh boy."
WildCat:We called in a orbital strike disguised as a freaky clown bus.
M3chan1c: "I send a reply message to (Fixer), with the audio of 'ear exploder 9000' followed by the phrase 'don't fucking send me an automated message at this hour asshole.'"
GM: "You guys unlocked the secret 'Halloweener funtime ending' enjoy runners."
Clown on a loudspeaker: "Looks like we've got a challenge here folks, let's see how this one goes!"
The orc wielding a magical, glowing claymore bursts out of the door, before immediately taking 6 thrown daggers to the temple and dropping dead on the spot.
Clown: "What a shame, I thought you'd be more fun!"
GM: "Well bulldozer, your neighbor is actually happy you just totaled his car, as he is no longer guilty of committing insurance fraud, he gives you a thumbs up before pretending to gasp at the damage."
Player After Action Reports (AARs)
M3chan1c: "Honestly pretty damn proud of myself this run, didn't even think of the Halloweeners when I put up the ad for a Halloween party, but it was a nice surprise, and a damn fine show too. I'm gonna have to post the trid of that mess online somewhere, best damn job I've had yet! Gotta love the folks you find in this line of work."
Rurosha
That as very wild, and also very entertaining. Didn't really have to anything hard myself. =p
WildCat: "I imagine this is what judging the Miss UCAS pageant is like: grab a seat, watch the show, walk away with a wad of Nuyen. Talent portion was wiz, glad we didn't get to the swimsuit competition."
Bulldozer
well.. i couldn't call this really a run considering we didn't do much beyond finding a target and pointing it with a laser pointer.. beyond that i didn't get to do much beyond getting popcorn.. wait whats this about swimsuits?