Shadowrun
Shadowrun Play => Gamemasters' Lounge => Topic started by: SirDelta on <07-06-11/2301:45>
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I'm going to throw this campaign idea out there for you guys to critique Would it be feasible?
My character (Jack Tower, the Combat Medic Gun-Adept)'s background basically reads like a conspiracy theory. Taken by secretive government Anti-Terrorist group to take out a shadowy terrorist organization. So, Plan 9, our conspiracy loving friend, gets wind of all of that, and so he hires team to do some "research" for him into his other conspiracy theories.
Would that work? (Also, I might need some advice on what to use as conspiracies.)
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Get a copy of Wild Palms (tv miniseries) and use the Friends and Fathers concept. They could be engaged in a covert warfare and you can tie all your conspiracies into them.
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It's certainly feasible.
Conspiracy theory research is a great hook (especially if the group have background ties to such things) and could include runs like:
- Rushing out to investigate strange lights (Experimental AA drone/vehicle tech, Aliens, Body-Snatching, new type of Astral entity etc)
- Grabbing evidence before 'The Man' makes it disappear (Data theft, extraction/kidnapping, eyewitness accounts, surveillance footage etc)
- Investigation of 'hidden' locations: Old maps lead to abandoned railways, labs, research facilities, ghoul territory etc
Whether you want any of these conspiracy options to hook up is entirely up to the GM
All missions could be completely unrelated, or maybe link clues into a bigger conspiracy to a major player (Illuminati, CIA, Ordo Maximus, Immortal Elves etc)
So, yes. Definitely feasible. I say run with it :)
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Great, "The Lone Gunmen" with actual firearms. ;D
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Of course it's feasible. Anything is feasible.
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I would totally play in that game, great idea
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Oh, I missed the last line.
Uh ... I guess it depends on what kind of conspiracies you want. Are you going balls-out X-Files everything (gov't, aliens, monsters, etc.)? Dresden Files? Warehouse 13? Just vampires? Just political?
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I think it is a great idea. I would love to play a heavy legwork, conspiracy game. I have been trying to cook up some sort of conspiracy game myself, something involving an AI-led secret organization.
The best part of conspiracy games is that some of the stuff they are doing can be complete red herrings, especially if they are working with Plan 9. I mean, they could be doing surveillance a dude who isn't involved in anything but in the process of watching him they have a run in with a go-gang, maybe step on the toes of politician or Knight Errant. They are stumbling into these moments and Plan 9 ends up making into something much larger. They could all think he is crazy, but then it turns out the Plan 9 is right. I say take a look at The Question character in Justice League Unlimited for out there conspiracy concepts that turn out to be good.
You could even have the first run have nothing to do with Plan 9, they see something they weren't supposed to and in the process of trying to sell the stuff they become wanted and it is Plan 9 who saves their bacon. Thus they are no longer hired, but now they are in his debt. They are thrust into the world as active participants rather than hired guns.
I found this thread at forum.rpg.net and found some of the stuff really helpful for cooking up ideas
http://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?552577-Real-objects-that-sound-like-they-should-be-RPG-MacGuffins.#post13262676
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Conspiracy theories for the win!
One of my players was idly sifting through the matrix looking for more leads on a bus-load of young convicts. I start giving him a few details about the thing, and then he changes track completely, asking me something on the line of "Anything unusual about this? I start checking forums for conspiracy theories!".
I was a bit confuddled by this, but if the players want conspiracies, then conspiracies they will get! So I asked him for some pondering-time and actually came up with a great idea considering the con-bus. Most of the prisoners were orks, with a sprinkle of other metas and just one or two humans. They were to be shipped off to Denver (the game is Seattle-based) to "re-adapt to society with no links to their former, destructive environment".
Behind the scene: Only the humans are supposed to survive the "program", that is actually nation-wide (UCAS) and fronted by lots of prominent persons with strong ties to the Humanis Policlub and such organizations. The books and missions (the idea wouldn´t have come to me had I not played the Denver missions and remembered the mention of one Iain Lesker, Denver anti-meta politician) really give you a lot to work with, Shadowrun has always been a great game for conspiracy theories (most of them not only theories).
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My best Non Elven/Dragon/Corporate conspiracy boogieman always revolved around the Black Lodge. Long history, lost knowledge, involvement with the church, spirit possession and rare magics. A dark agenda and multiple chapters make for easy placement in almost any story.
Edit: Originally from Threats 1
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The Black Lodge on the other hand was secret, widespread, globally influential and apparently connected to a bunch of conspiratorial societies and groups (Templars, Rosicrucians and Freemasons to name a few). Its membership is highly hierachical and cell-structured for additional secrecy. It is conspiratorial as well as initiatory and works behind the scenes. All of which are characteristics of Illuminati conspiracy.
http://forums.dumpshock.com/index.php?s=&showtopic=15332&view=findpost&p=472150
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Alright, I have another question.
How would I go about ending this if I tied it all together into one giant conspiracy (ex. Illuminati are behind everything, etc.)? The problem I see is that one you can do one of two things. They find out, and then nothing new really happens except they might be hunted. Or, they could tumble the conspiracy. But the problem with the first is that their is no real closure or sense of accomplishment. The problem with the second is that it makes no sense. How can five people top a global conspiracy? Help?
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Wait, are you running or playing in this campaign?
I'd advise against trying to run GMPCs even in a normal game model, and for that matter even in a hack-n-slash dungeon crawl, but in anything that is heavy story submersion and intrigue a GMPC is going to be nigh upno impossible to have as anything other than a) the guy that only pops into existence when someone remembers he needs to be there (like combat for instance), or b) the guy that leads the rest of the group around by the nose, has all the right insights when everyone else is puzzled, and is able to connect the dots with startling accuracy.
I'm all for intrigue and conspiracy, but its not easy to write and a GMPC is more likely to be a problem than a benefit.
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How would I go about ending this if I tied it all together into one giant conspiracy (ex. Illuminati are behind everything, etc.)? The problem I see is that one you can do one of two things. They find out, and then nothing new really happens except they might be hunted. Or, they could tumble the conspiracy. But the problem with the first is that their is no real closure or sense of accomplishment. The problem with the second is that it makes no sense. How can five people top a global conspiracy? Help?
I have the same questions as Onion Man.
Are you GM?
Are are you player?
A conspiracy theory game requires the PC's to be the spotlight, uncovering secrets, making weird and wacky links in the conspiracy and following them through of their own accord.
If the GM has a GM-PC in the mix, then the other players will lose that whole mystique and the metagaming will begin, and whether they mean to or not, they will start looking to Jack Tower for extra evidence, as he's a GM-controlled character.
Really not recommended, especially for this instance.
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Look at Fulcrum and the Ring from Chuck, or the Trust from Stargate SG-1/Atlantis, or the Centre from The Pretender (I never figured that place out). Now throw magic and the matrix into the mix. Backstory galore.
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Look at real life:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_Awareness_Office
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You have to create layers and build into it. At first your just doing normal runs (local). At some point you stumble into something that has higher implications (national, international, and corporate). At some point you begin to weave in the bigger groups that are manipulating this stuff. Hell, your players probably shouldn't know they are in this type of game until some Illuminati level hitters come to take back that innocuous data disc.
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With the following checklist it could work:
1: Are the PCs the stars fo the story?
2: Are the PCs making tangible, steady progress toward a goal?
3: Are the player's interested in this type of game?
If all three are true, should be fun. If any of the above is not true, it falls apart. If the story centers around things other than the characters the players end up being spectators rather than the prime movers of the story. If the PCs never make any really progess to understanding what is going on your players may get very frustrated. And if your players just aren't into it, you are doomed. Doooooomed I say. But as long as you can check off all three items you are good to go.
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I have my own conspiracy theorist for when I'm writing things for my group (Which is news reports with add-ons by ShadowSEA posters.). He's... Quite out there.
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I'm a player in the game. We have a GM, but he doesn't write his own stuff.
And believe me, the gamemy character would have no answers. How I'm thinking of doing it is having them investigate various different conspiracies, instead of one big one. That way, if the GM wants to tie them together, he sure can. If he doesn't want to, he doesn't have to. The only reason I threw my character in is that his backstory could easily be considered as something a conspiracy theorist might think. The rest is not going to be connected to his backstory at all.
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Well, if you're a pink mohawk group you can just non sequitur your runs a la Scooby Doo.
Darn those meddling Shadowrunners.
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One of the guys I work with for ideas commented about Shadowgang in the other forum (http://forums.dumpshock.com/index.php?s=&showtopic=21806&view=findpost&p=702322).
Which reminds me, I have to pull out the "Muse Stick" and beat another chapter out of him...
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"Calling it a theory suggests that it only 'might' be happening. Don't cry to me when they're selling your organs to the Colombians and your bone marrow to the bugs."