[gilga]

Group lifestyle works for me.
I am still crunching to start with a proper cyberdeck. So anything to keep costs down helps.

[Lorebane24]

Would an attack dongle or stealth dongle do the trick for a dabbler?

[Jack_Spade]

I'm all for group lifestyle. Medium with four people costs 6500, so 1625 per person.
And of course I'll take free contacts

Madcat .... nickname, or standard combat form? :p

Yes 

As for the resources issue: Downtime becomes the limiting factor - as it realistically should be - and yes, resources E is a lot easier to pull off - but then people with resources A will enjoy the fact that they actually earn enough money to replace their gear when it breaks (one of the reasons I hesitate to play a drone rigger in anything but games with high cash flow.) It also enables the team to save up for some nice gear - like a common owned airplane or helicopter.

[Lorebane24]

As far as cash rewards go, I actually mix that one up a lot, depending on employer.  Some Johnsons might offer to pay per PC, others offer one lump sum to the party.  Some offer an advance, some wont show you a cent till the job is done, and some might have a fixer to hold the money in escrow.  Regardless, I rarely give out large piles of cash ( it's rare for one of my runners to take home more than 15k apiece for a run, and it usually starts smaller than that, but I always try to include chances for gear upgrades, whether that is a Johnson paying you in cyber parts or a chance to snatch a prototype deck from a lab.

[Tecumseh]

Lots of thoughts; I'm probably going to forget some of them.

Gilga/Maka's Increased Attribute spells make her pretty versatile. She can reliably get 3 hits and lock them in with Focused Concentration, which means that her social pools are closer to 12 than 9. That's good enough to make her a Face in my opinion, if Beta wants to go another direction.

I've run 5 PbP games and played in 3 others and am constantly experimenting with the rewards system. The bad news is that it is difficult to balance character progression. (I love my Awakened characters, but let's be honest that they can do much, much more with 30 karma than a mundane character can.) The good news is that there are a ton of tools at the GM's disposal. In addition to karma and nuyen, the GM can give Contacts, or gear, or Attribute points for dump stats, or reduced skill training costs for specific skills, or any other number of things that can provide a meaningful sense of progression without unbalancing the game. Questions to consider not just how much but how often, as PbP games can stretch for months and years. I could write on this for pages and pages so I'll stop here unless we want to dive into it deeper. I will say that we have a highly-experienced, mature group of players here and that's a tremendous asset in itself. That alone will help keep things balanced.

Personally, I would love a home base, but I'll note that it might not be leveraged much if we're hopping between locations. I just want to make sure that the time and attention we spend building it out is proportional to the amount we use it.

I'm also happy with a group lifestyle, as it sounds like we have some common themes among us besides employment. Sioux, In Debt, a couple Impassives, a couple Thrill Seekers.

Group contacts also make a lot of sense, given the nature of the agency. Is there an assumption about how long we've been in "business" and working together? A week, a month, a year?

@gilga How far away are you from a proper cyberdeck?

I know Beta is still working on concepts. We should figure out a team vehicle too, unless that comes with the office. I put aside enough for a motorcycle but would have to pinch to come up with a Ford Americar or a Mercury Comet.

@Lorebane How much background do you want? 20 Questions?

[Beta]

Just to warn you all, I'm taking a side trip in looking at technomancers ... trying to see if between the errata earlier this year and the house rules I can make one who could cover the cybercombat angle, and be a useful investigator, and still do some other useful things.  (for this sort of game I don't want to only buff other peoples gear).

@Lorebane :  looking at TMs does raise the question:  would you be open to a partial rebuild of one, once we get our hands on kill code?  It looks like they get a lot of new options, but I don't want to say "I'm not ready until then"

I think I'm actually going to get some time to read rulebooks tonight and scribble some numbers down, so should be able to figure out if I want to pursue this angle.  If I don't I'll get back to statting up something else tomorrow.



Rough concept there is

[Lorebane24]

If someone makes a TM, I'd be fine with taking another look at them when Kill Code hits.  When that times comes, I figure it will be a conversation, essentially asking whether or not it effectively addresses Technos.  If it does, full rebuild will be in the cards.  If not, we'll take a look at what options from the book we'd want and look at how to incorporate them into these house rules.

[Lorebane24]

Aight, here are the shared contacts.

[Tecumseh]

Clarifying questions on the group contacts:

All are Connection 3, got that.

We get free points equal to 2 + Charisma/2, capped at 5. So, in Machk's case, 3 points. I can spend these on Loyalty for the group contacts, and if I spend any on a specific contact then I don't personally know them, correct?

Does Loyalty start at 0 or at 1? If I spend all 3 of Machk's free points on Heather Huxley, street doc who can't repair her own face, is her Loyalty 3 or 4? If it's 3, can I spend one of my chargen contact points to make it 4?

Does Johnny Morad only sell guns or does he sell other weapons and ammo as well?

[Lorebane24]

Yes, loyalty starts at 0 for all of them.  Jonny Morad specializes in instruments of war that are street legal, if just barely, so he stocks guns, ammo, armor, and accessories.  Hus milspec stash can unclude items with an F availabilty, like an Ares Alpha or Mossberg.

[gilga]

I am making some modifications to Amy Maka nothing crucial, but I am giving up the Morgan, and converting some karma to money and start with an Erika. It would make her a reasonable decker. Will update her soon + contacts and everything.

[Tecumseh]

@gilga, if Beta goes technomancer does that change your desire to play a decker-lite? I know you're pouring a lot of resources into a deck, plus a lot of skill group points into the necessary skills.

@GM Can we put our chargen points for Contacts into the group contacts?

@GM How much background do you want for the PCs?

@All Any thoughts on a team car or van?

[Beta]

I looked it over, and I'm not going techno.  There is a VERY viable character there, especially for a PI, but not the sort of limited+focused build I was looking for I don't think.  Plus a lot of dice rolling, and my least  liked part of pbp games is pasting in all those dice rolls.

What I am playing to be decided very shortly.  Need to squeeze in time to rough out a couple of ideas then make a decision.

[Lorebane24]

As far as background, I like what I see so far.  20 questions seems a little excessive, because while useful, I feel like only abput 30-40% od the answers really define the character.  What I am mostly looking for us....

What motivates you beyond money amd survival?  Any jobs they wont take?  What ideals would they betray an employer for?

Where did they come from and how did tjey get here?

What are the two or three most important formative experiences im your life?  I like to try and fold major background evemts into the plot if I can, so the more details you give me about people and events here, the more I have to work with.

How did they acquire their skillset?

Any personal goals?

[Jack_Spade]

I usually have to play the character a bit before I can really answer those questions, but I'll do my best:

- Seeing action is MadCats main motivation to do anything. His totem has a strong influence upon him, making him live in the moment with no particular longterm strategy.
- Jobs he won't take have usually something to do with them being boring or distasteful - he doesn't lie or at least not well and he has little regard for anyone trying to rob someone of their freedom. He is a man of his word and wouldn't betray anyone who hasn't betrayed him first - but he might openly pull out of a deal if it came in conflict with someone he considers friends or family
- He came from a middle class family with divided ancestory - white and native, so he always was on the lookout for something he could truly belong to, which quickly came into conflict with his valued personal freedom
- The experiences I would have to develop inplay, but it's likely feelings of rejection (during school), acceptance (military service) and betrayal (discharge after his misconduct).
- His main goal is to earn enough to be able to enjoy his freedom - which currently stands in stark contrast to having debts with the Sioux Mafia.


@Tecumseh
If I don't by the bike, I can offer 5000 Nuyen for a team vehicle.