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Chasing the Wind: Question about Sam

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Gripper

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« on: <05-07-14/1834:12> »
SPOILER ALERT

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Samantha was captured 20 years ago, or approximately 2056. Technomancers didn't exist back then, okay, so I assume she was some mundane who got experimented on, or an otaku.

Remo is sticking around due to loyalty to her. When did Remo come along? Did he find her at Janus Industries? Why is he loyal to her?

I can make things up (Remo felt a need to correct the wrong done to her. Done) , but I wonder if there is any official word on this, or if I missed something when reading the adventure.

Dr. Meatgrinder

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« Reply #1 on: <05-07-14/2121:39> »
Samantha's background was left intentionally vague, so there's no official data about her.






SPOILER WARNING (since the spoiler tag seems to have gone away)






Pretty much the only way the runners would ever find out about Samantha's background is by taking and reading Nick Ryder's Lone Star case file on her abduction (or mind probing Ryder), and even Ryder doesn't know what Janus did to her.  Even Samantha doesn't know anything about her background.  She's spent 20 of her 26 years between medical tanks and operating theaters, so she knows pretty much only what she's learned since she escaped.  And Remo would have all but demolished the research area of the Janus host while busting Samantha out, so there's nothing to find on her in the host.

That being said...and this is just how I thought of her (lesson to learn as I hope to keep writing--write down this stuff!), so take it with the appropriate container of salt:

As I envisioned her when I wrote the mission, Samantha was an otaku, rolled up (kidnapped) as soon as someone noticed her gift.  Janus did more genetic experimentation (trying to reproduce her gift) than anything else.  Looking at her stat block, you'll notice that all of her augmentations are delta-grade bioware.  I had envisioned these (fluff-wise) as unintentional results of massive genetic modification, but there are no rules for that in SR5 so that's how I statted things out.

Her childhood "imaginary friend," Remo, became a sprite over the years, and then eventually became a free sprite during Janus' experimentations on Samantha.  His relationship with her is likely what kept them both from going completely insane after what she's gone through and what he's watched Janus' doctors do to her.  As Remo grew in power, he eventually became powerful enough to crack the host.
Guiding principle for game balance:  Players avoid underpowered stuff and flock to overpowered stuff.
Missions Freelancer (SRM 04-10 Romero & Juliette, SRM 05-01 Chasin' the Wind, SRM 06-06 Falling Angels, PM-02 A Holy Piece of Wetwork)

Gripper

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« Reply #2 on: <05-08-14/0046:14> »
A response from the author himself  :D.  I, sir, am honored. *bowing respectfully*

Having her augmentations be the result of genetic testing seems more in line with her situation than Janus creating a super soldier.

I really like this module, by the way. It gives you a chance to go through Chicago to get a great grip on the scenery while introducing some of the notable characters. It kind of has the feeling of the introduction to the first Half-Life game where you go through the facility, knowing things are (relatively) peaceful now but leaving the ominous sense that it's gonna get real bad real soon.

AlHazred

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« Reply #3 on: <07-09-14/1533:38> »
My players wanted to bust back in there and rescue the rest of them. In the interest of not walking over what might be a later module, I was intentionally vague.

Dr. Meatgrinder

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« Reply #4 on: <07-09-14/2032:17> »
My players wanted to bust back in there and rescue the rest of them. In the interest of not walking over what might be a later module, I was intentionally vague.

That's cool as far as I know, as long as they get there before those to whom they sold the data.  Given the time constraints of a convention, I've never seen a team stick around that long.  I think I had one table think about it but decide to leave them.

On the other hand, my primary Missions PC is one of the clones (named Samantha-7)...my first street sam.  Not as badass as the original, but plenty deadly.  She's freaked out a couple of players, sometimes because I describe her as "if you've played Chasin' the Wind you recognize her" and sometimes because she was a little twitchy in her early missions. :o  Okay, she's still a little twitchy.  ::)
Guiding principle for game balance:  Players avoid underpowered stuff and flock to overpowered stuff.
Missions Freelancer (SRM 04-10 Romero & Juliette, SRM 05-01 Chasin' the Wind, SRM 06-06 Falling Angels, PM-02 A Holy Piece of Wetwork)

PittsburghRPGA

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« Reply #5 on: <07-10-14/0947:12> »
I've had two groups go back and rescue them all before selling the information.  Even going so far as to buy them clothes (since they are nakkie in the tanks), renting a bus from Goober, and bringing them all to the pizza joint to dump on Nick Ryder. Only one of those groups had a technomancer in it (and he kind of treated it as a Mission From God).

Eric

Dr. Meatgrinder

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« Reply #6 on: <07-10-14/1637:48> »
Cool!  It amazes me that players have responded so well to the character(s).  I admit I set out to ramp up the creepy factor in that scene, but I wondered how a typical group of shadowrunners ("shoot people in the face for money") would react to them, and I rather expected a darker outcome (as evidenced by the possible outcomes on the debriefing log).
Guiding principle for game balance:  Players avoid underpowered stuff and flock to overpowered stuff.
Missions Freelancer (SRM 04-10 Romero & Juliette, SRM 05-01 Chasin' the Wind, SRM 06-06 Falling Angels, PM-02 A Holy Piece of Wetwork)

The Masked Ferret

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« Reply #7 on: <07-10-14/1727:51> »
I have had 2 groups that rescued all the girls and clothed them, I was in one where we rescued and clothed them.

OTOH, I ran for a group that tried to take her by force. She outright killed the mage (Called shot on her part + 2 crit glitches on dodge and soak, he burned an edge to survive) and she ran off the Street Sam and the Technomancer. Sam can be dangerous when you sneak up on her and then suddenly someone else rushes her with a weapon in hand.
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Tony Gambino

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« Reply #8 on: <09-10-14/0157:58> »
I ran this for four players, it was the first shadowrun other than WTT6W for two of them. One of the veterans wanted to rescue them all, one fo the newbies wanted to blow the lab. The players spent about 5 minutes convincing him not to.

Had I been a player in this mission I would have freed the rest of the clones at the time of the datasteal section of the job.

Dr. Meatgrinder, you playing one of the clones as a missions character is BAD ASS. I hope I get to run for/with that character some time. Perhaps I will see you at GenCon next year.  8)

Valkyrie

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« Reply #9 on: <09-10-14/1033:14> »
Rescued all of them, bought them clothes, and used negotiation to make sure Ryder would see to it that they all had a place to stay.

My missions character really likes Sam, and now has the goal of capping out loyalty.  We're up to 3.

Dr. Meatgrinder

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« Reply #10 on: <09-10-14/1843:54> »
My missions character really likes Sam, and now has the goal of capping out loyalty.  We're up to 3.

Nice!  How are you working that?  Just curious, since I've seen very few people do more than place a phone call to their contacts.  The best I've seen is how you might expect routine contact to work in SR--slip them a few nuyen when they give you some useful info.

Dr. Meatgrinder, you playing one of the clones as a missions character is BAD ASS. I hope I get to run for/with that character some time. Perhaps I will see you at GenCon next year.  8)

Thanks!  And I should be at Gen Con! :)  (I was there this year, but only played one slot and GMed three.)
Guiding principle for game balance:  Players avoid underpowered stuff and flock to overpowered stuff.
Missions Freelancer (SRM 04-10 Romero & Juliette, SRM 05-01 Chasin' the Wind, SRM 06-06 Falling Angels, PM-02 A Holy Piece of Wetwork)

The Masked Ferret

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« Reply #11 on: <09-11-14/0906:41> »
My missions character really likes Sam, and now has the goal of capping out loyalty.  We're up to 3.

Nice!  How are you working that?  Just curious, since I've seen very few people do more than place a phone call to their contacts.  The best I've seen is how you might expect routine contact to work in SR--slip them a few nuyen when they give you some useful info.

I think I run for Valkyrie. The Valkyrie I know calls Sam all, the time, hangs out with her, and has hired her to go on a run or two. When you spend time and nuyen on your contacts, it pays off. Of course, it can be hard to do in some convention games. Especially with a Pickup group. And I generally require a good bit of roleplay interactions. I have at least 3 regular players who seek out contacts and try to grow them.
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Valkyrie

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« Reply #12 on: <09-17-14/1100:01> »
I think I run for Valkyrie. The Valkyrie I know calls Sam all, the time, hangs out with her, and has hired her to go on a run or two. When you spend time and nuyen on your contacts, it pays off. Of course, it can be hard to do in some convention games. Especially with a Pickup group. And I generally require a good bit of roleplay interactions. I have at least 3 regular players who seek out contacts and try to grow them.

Yep, that'd be me. 

Nice!  How are you working that?  Just curious, since I've seen very few people do more than place a phone call to their contacts.  The best I've seen is how you might expect routine contact to work in SR--slip them a few nuyen when they give you some useful info.
I tend to also see contacts as Pokemon... even if that NPC wasn't intended to be a contact, my character will schmooze, bribe, hire, and generally do what it takes to make friends.  You can never have too many friends.  Once I have them, so long as we aren't pressed for time, I use contacts and pay them well for services (often intentionally failing to negotiate).  One time, at GenCon, our team lacked any matrix support whatsoever... but I have matrix contacts, so one comcall later, a few thousand nuyen transferred, and we get the hacking done as needed, plus generous pay ups the loyalty.

Tony Gambino

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« Reply #13 on: <09-18-14/1058:43> »
Valkyrie,
I like your style. When I was new to Shadowrun our GM ran us through Season 2 (I think, the one in Denver) and we did not really know how to use contacts yet, and started calling Raven, a Shaman with the Denver Vorry for everything. We would throw him money, always spent loads of cash at his bar, the Denim, and anytime we got magical loot we would give it to him. As the campaign stretched on our GM started mixing in more and more of his own content in place of the Missions games and we were able to give Raven access to a bloodmagic book or three, books stolen from Damien Knight's personal library, something taken from one of the metaplanes via an alchera, all kinds of stuff. By the time our "Season 1" was over almost 30 sessions later we were drugged and left for dead it was Raven who sent a party looking for us and saved our asses. It's been 6 years on that campaign, we are about to start our "season 3" (now exclusively our GM's own material) and we all still keep in touch with Raven, and have bigtime loyalty.

Dunedon

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« Reply #14 on: <11-11-14/1626:21> »
I have a question on Sam's stats ... With an listed essence of 0.8, accord g to the rules she should have a revised resonance rating of 0 and her submersion rating should also go to 0?

Or what am I mis-reading? :)