[PiXeL01]

After reading through both 2XS and Burning Bright again for the who-knows-what time I have been thinking to set my group up to actually work FOR an insect hive/shaman.

Has anyone pulled this trick on their players before (hopefully outside of Chicago)?
How was the storyline and how did it end?

[Reiper]

I was in a campaign in 3rd edition where we were working for an insect shaman.

Unfortunately the campaign never got finished because our GM's parents moved before we finished it, but we had just figured out who we were working for and were about to betray him.

[Shaidar]

SR1 Module Queen Euphoria has the runners starting off working for a business partner corporation of an Insect Shaman initially anyway.

[Poindexter]

fuck it. cut out the middle man, dude.

have em working directly for a free insect spirit. Those fuckers can be tricky. There's a roach in chicago who im TOTALLY about to give my players some jobs from.

[Imveros]

SPOILERS! GAWD

[8-bit]

That's what I was thinking, but I was really hoping he was talking about a different group. That's ok, should be fun.

[Crimsondude]

How directly? Because if you work for the Empowerment Coalition, or MOM, or the Timmons Memorial Fund, or a couple other groups, you basically are working for insect spirits.

[8-bit]

How directly? Because if you work for the Empowerment Coalition, or MOM, or the Timmons Memorial Fund, or a couple other groups, you basically are working for insect spirits.

Wait... MOM is a front for insect spirits!? Holy... it all makes sense now. It's like the exact same trick the Universal Brotherhood pulled, and I never even knew. My mind is blown.

What book, if any, has the information on those groups harboring insect spirits? Because that sounds like extremely useful information.

[PiXeL01]

I didn't know any of them were bug fronts either. Sources?

[Crimsondude]

Parts of MOM, like in Seattle. Though there are other bugs that hate those bugs. (Seattle 2072)

Empowerment/Timmons (Seattle 2072, Loose Alliances, Shadows of the Underworld, Super Tuesday)

N'dranghetta Mafia in Italy is run by a wasp spirit and filled with wasp spirits (Shadows of Europe, Vice, Artifacts Unbound)

Ares has a bug problem of its own right now (Threats 2, Storm Front, Sacrificial Limb, Corporate Guide, etc.)

There is a lot of info on what the bugs are doing to regroup and adapt to current extermination efforts in Conspiracy Theories.

Funny enough, of all places, bugs seem to be least of your problems in Chicago right now.

[PiXeL01]

I guess I'm not paranoid enough (or simply blind)  but all the information I've read about MOM even in the books you revered to didn't get my bug hunter sense tingling. They are accepting all within their ranks, that is true. Maybe some of their members could be shamans using MOM as a front but I don't see the entire organization like that.
Maybe I'm not cynical enough and actually hopes a bit of light in the SR universe or I'm just can't solve the puzzle although I have all the bricks at hand :/

[The Wyrm Ouroboros]

Although to be fair, MOM/Timmons/Empowerment is run by Mantids, who want nothing more than to wipe the others from the face of the earth ...

[Crimsondude]

Although to be fair, MOM/Timmons/Empowerment is run by Mantids, who want nothing more than to wipe the others from the face of the earth ...

This is true. Well ... MOM is now run by Mantids, after they ripped apart the non-Mantid flesh form like they did to the flesh form Gen. Yeats — in both cases effectively decapitating the bodies and taking control of their respective organizations (MOM and the GOP).

Also, to say they are "run" by Mantids doesn't mean that everyone at the top is a Mantid. Most of the metahuman women at the top of these organizations know (some, at least) of the Mantid spirits and have agreed to work with them. For example, Anne Penchyk, the former Republican Congresswoman and VP/Presidential candidate and head of the EP/Timmons Fund and player in MOM is a run of the mil ork. But she is working with Mantids and has for a while, and at some point either she's going to die or become a Mantis Spirit because she's an ork and orks don't live forever.

Just for shits and giggles, take a look at the ratio of men to women mentioned in the DeeCee chapter of Conspiracy Theories.

[PiXeL01]

Thank you for clearing that up for me.
It does bring something to light that can potentially have serious consequences in my campaign as I have their main Johnson being a male troll MOM member.

[Michael Chandra]

Look at the bright side: It means he isn't a mantid and the top likely has no intent to promote him high enough. Remember, Mantids hate other bugs and only go for women (for hosts and shamans you pervs).