[El Diablo]

Why, hello!

I am trying to come up with a short session inspired in the Remember Me game. I haven't finished it yet, mind you.

The most important aspect would be the MacGuffin (or the device that drives the plot), similar to the game:

... introduces the mechanic of 'memory remixing': entering and rearranging a target's memories to manipulate them. Players accomplish this by replaying a memory and modifying details to change the target's recollection of the outcome.

I am thinkin' on introducing a very complicated and handheld machine or device that works similar to Alter Memory spell. I want this to be a prototype and the Runners are hired by a Johnson to retrieve it and destroy any evidence or blueprints from a ... Shiawase Corporation? secret lab. In such laboratory they discover the true function of the device: to create the perfect wage slave or the perfect convicts.

Infiltration, kick the door and/or hacking are the available methods to reach the MacGuffin and the experiments.

Now, the questions:

Is Shiawase the indicated corp for such device?

What other twisted secrets the Runners should find inside the lab?

In case someone uses the device, how many dices should it roll? What Force?

Any suggestion and/or change you have for me?

Thanks in advance.

[Mirikon]

The tech already exists, but it is most definitely not handheld. The smaller units are at least the size of a desktop, iirc, and require hours to work. The changes it makes are also permanent, unless someone changes them back, unlike the Alter Memory spell, which can wear off over time. Check the 4E material for PAB units, I forget what book they're in.

And honestly, do you really want PCs anywhere near a piece of tech that can quickly and easily make permanent edits to a person's brain?

[El Diablo]

The tech already exists, but it is most definitely not handheld. The smaller units are at least the size of a desktop, iirc, and require hours to work. The changes it makes are also permanent, unless someone changes them back, unlike the Alter Memory spell, which can wear off over time. Check the 4E material for PAB units, I forget what book they're in.

And honestly, do you really want PCs anywhere near a piece of tech that can quickly and easily make permanent edits to a person's brain?

Psychoanalyst Assisted Biofeedback. Chrome Flesh, page 51. It takes hours, indeed. My idea is to make it a Complext Action at must, that's why it's so revolutionary and dangerous.

The group tends to be professionals and so far they've never betrayed a Johnson. Also, if they keep the device, more than one AAA will go after the group.

[Herr Brackhaus]

I would make the owning corp Horizon just because they've been messing with people's head for a long time, or Renraku as the go-to bat-shit-crazy experimental corp.

As for the MacGuffin, I would make it limited in some way. Have it require radical reagents to function, for example, or orichalcum, or some sort of exceedingly rare and expensive resource that could explain it's incredible abilities and limit it's danger in Tue hands of the players.

[El Diablo]

I would make the owning corp Horizon just because they've been messing with people's head for a long time, or Renraku as the go-to bat-shit-crazy experimental corp.

Thanks for the suggestions.

As for the MacGuffin, I would make it limited in some way. Have it require radical reagents to function, for example, or orichalcum, or some sort of exceedingly rare and expensive resource that could explain it's incredible abilities and limit it's danger in Tue hands of the players.

Does no one trust their players here, uh? I get your point, though. The idea is to return it to the Johnson and he will destroy it: Johnson is quite open 'bout that. In the meantime, yes, perhaps I should add a high recharging time.

[Mirikon]

Does no one trust their players here, uh? I get your point, though. The idea is to return it to the Johnson and he will destroy it: Johnson is quite open 'bout that. In the meantime, yes, perhaps I should add a high recharging time.

NO! And neither should you, honestly. There is so much that could go horribly, horribly wrong with this plot, especially if your characters have ANY imagination AT ALL.

If it was portable and only took seconds to work, you could easily find a way to get in a room with, say, a district attorney, or other, more influential people. The ability to do drek like this is one of the main reasons people geek the mage first! Mind control is scary ass shit to a lot of people. Hell, I could link you a few dozen tumblrs of hypnosis/mind control fetish type themes to show you all the ways that this could go bad. But I'll simply limit it to this simple thought, "What could you do if you made a megacorp executive your bitch?" Or perhaps you prefer politicians, like the President of the UCAS? And so on.

Hell, even in D&D, the ability to rewrite someone's mind is treated as a horribly evil spell, and is at least 8th level (meaning you gotta be at least 15th level to cast it). You can literally make someone your willing slave, and leave them thinking it was their idea. That shit is NOT something to play around with.

Also, please note that whatever corp is responsible for such tech WILL go on a manhunt to make sure the tech is recovered/destroyed, and anyone not with the corp that knew about it will be sanitized with extreme prejudice. And yes, that means corporate kill teams, even if they hand off the prototype. This is the kind of thing any mega will scorch the earth and salt the ashes to keep a lid on.

And such a prototype wouldn't be kept anywhere but in the equivalent of a MCT Zero Zone INSIDE another Zero Zone.

[Herr Brackhaus]

To my mind it's less about trust in my players and more about internal consistency; such an item, at least without some form of restriction, would be immensely powerful and highly sought after. It'd be the kind of item or technology other megas would risk corporate warfare over, and as such they wouldn't "just" send a few runners after something that would be incredibly well guarded, except as a diversion if anything.

[Mirikon]

Honestly, El Diablo, I sympathize with your wanting to take a... not completely terrible game, and make a run out of it. But you're talking about tech that could literally shake the world. It is on the same level as adding in those patches that give you superpowers in Bioshock games, because that's cool. Only it completely destroys Shadowrun's game world and balance, because things are set up very different here.

Another big problem is you're trying to boil all this down to a 'short Mission'. This is the kind of thing CAMPAIGNS (or at least story arcs) are made out of!

Now, you want to do a memory-remixing story, that's cool. There's a dozen ways to go about it, that could easily tie into the world of Shadowrun. PAB, Personafix/simsense, Alter Memory spells, a combo of drugs and suggestion, forced spirit pacts, and more! Just be very careful about putting your players on the receiving end of stuff like that. Rewriting their characters for them is something a lot of players take offense to.