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DragonCon 2011

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gargaM0NK

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« on: <07-08-11/2030:41> »
My group of 4-6 played two missions at DragonCon this year, and I wanted to give some feedback.

6 of us and one other player (by GM permission) played CMP 2011-07 Super Brawl Sunday, and LOVED it.  Everyone on our team got a chance to shine, the compensation was nice, and it was action packed from beginning to end.  It felt good all game through, and we even finished a little early.  We liked checking all of the boxes off on the sheet, at the end.
[spoiler]
I don't necessarily prefer the no-legwork style of this one, but I did appreciate that we didn't have that epoch (as we have in other runs) where no one knew how to tease out the next part of the plot.  SBS had clear direction the whole way through, and the in-character time constraints motivated us to keep things moving OOC as well.

The negotiation didn't have a lot of the "important information that's crucial for the run" for the face to get, but he negotiated a decent price and was happy.  And the upshot was that our only question was the order of operations for best chance at success.

We hacked commlinks and negotiated in one conflict, so hackers/faces got time, which was awesome.
Then we infiltrated, used drones/illusion for the second scene, giving the our covert ops, the technomancer and mage the front.
Then we were all at the mercy of our Gone in 60 Seconds-esque jack-of-all-trades driver to have a shot at the third scene, and everybody enjoyed the movement/gridlink override/drive test conflict to get there.

I also liked that the urban brawl was optional on a per-character basis.  Those of us who'd gotten plenty of screen time earlier but weren't built for combat were more than happy to let our combatants brawl it out, and this became the subject of IC jokes in the next run we did (about "that shiny ring on so-and-so's finger".
[/spoiler]
I would happily recommend this run to a friend.

Then four of the 6 of us played CMP 2011-05 Burn Notice.  We were a little less impressed with this run, I'm sorry to say.
[spoiler]
Our GM warned us that contacting Suspense's handler in the middle of the night (after the meet) might not meet with the best reaction, so we chose to pursue other leads first.  We thought Suspense's residence was a reasonable starting point, but found Nothing that pointed us anywhere, with with 6+ hits on mundane/astral/matrix perception.

This left us with the Vory lead that our technomancer had uncovered, but once we started down that road, it felt a little constricted.  We had to do the side-job NOW. That done, they were willing to show us the hideout NOW (before we could contact the handler and get a better picture of what's up).  We found a way to extract the target quietly but the goons Insisted that we kill the guards one way or another.

Having completed the extraction, we were frustrated by the target's lack of cooperation.  We had reason to believe there was some foul play, and wanted the whole story to present to our Johnson in case he changed his mind (and so we had a better idea of what was going on).  We had a combination of 6+ hit social rolls, guns to the face, and compel truth, and she wouldn't so much as answer the question "Can you give us any reason we shouldn't kill you right now?"

It felt like we were doing everything we could to tease the plot out of the mission, and it was stubbornly resisting us.

This led our techno to look into the files, which brings me to my third complaint.  Evidently the chip was in some way tamper proof, as the hacker's attempts to conceal his investigation were instantly noticed by the Johnson.  Worse, the information that he found (which cost us half our pay and notoriety) didn't do anything to explain what was going on either.

Finally, after we handed the Johnson the data and showed him the target's status, he yelled at us, denied us our money, and threw us out of the club, Without telling us why.  (We didn't know IC that the techno had compromised the data).  Had he done so, we could have argued that either the target or the Azzies could have compromised it (and how did he know it wasn't them in the first place), but he wouldn't even tell us Why he wasn't paying us.

I understand OC that, him being who he is, he is not afraid of us, and doesn't need to explain himself.  It just seemed like bad business.  All of our characters told our fixers not to work with that Johnson again, and wouldn't take further runs from him, and all he would have had to do is say Why he was ending the deal.
[/spoiler]

All-in-all we enjoyed the experience.  When we play together, one of us has to run it, so it was fun to play as a team.  I'd love more runs with SBS's strengths: clear direction, fast pace, and challenges for any character type.

I'll see you again next year.  Cheers,
--gargaM0NK
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Previous post:

Hey guys.  I know DragonCon is still months off, and by no means the top convention priority at the moment, but I had a really good time playing missions last year, and I'm excited about registering for games again this year.

Anyway, I've kept an I on their gaming registration web site (http://gaming.dragoncon.org/index.php/eventsearch), and I see 3 Shadowrun games, but no missions.  I'm assuming that missions Will be at DragonCon, and the sessions just haven't been scheduled yet.

My question is, where should I check to keep up-to-date on when they do get posted?

Thanks in advance,
   gargaM0NK
« Last Edit: <09-17-11/1040:19> by gargaM0NK »

Kai

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« Reply #1 on: <07-09-11/1308:05> »
Hey there! I'm Kai, the Coordinator for Shadowrun at Dragon*Con, at least somewhat officially :) Unlike most conventions Dragon*Con will take anyone willing to work the hours as a GM and companies cannot get GM badges.  This results in random games run by random people, like what's on the schedule now, and me trying to wait as long as possible to set the schedule in hopes of getting the most GMs possible to commit to running things.

I can only push back for another week or so, and then events will be going up, you can keep checking the Dragon*Con site, I will post an update here, on the Dumpshock Forums, and on the GM coordination site, 404 Future Gaming

wylie

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« Reply #2 on: <07-09-11/1802:27> »
@ KAI
I won't know until the middle of August if I am able to come down. Depending on my ride, I want to run between 2 & 5 games.

Sorry for the last minute holdout, but money is tight & walmart is jacking around with gas prices

gargaM0NK

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« Reply #3 on: <07-14-11/1526:27> »
Hey Kai!

Thanks for the response.  I'll keep checking, and good luck getting everything setup.  Shadowrun was one of my favorite parts of DragonCon the last 2 years, and I'm looking forward to it again this year.

Cheers!

Adamdyent

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« Reply #4 on: <08-22-11/0910:09> »
I am a gm from Memphis and will be coming to Dragon Con. My gf and I are interested in playing a game. I won't be able to GM while I am there. If anyone has any suggestions on a game please tell me. Also, I may have another friend coming to play also.

Critias

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« Reply #5 on: <08-28-11/2314:50> »
Have fun at DragonCon, everyone (but especially the Ancient Pawns and Super Brawl Sunday players and GMs)!

If you see any members of the Cobra 21st Infantry ("bluesuits," just like from GI Joe), tell 'em Rusty/Critias says hi, and it's too bad I couldn't suit up and make it this year.