[Nath]

And just a reminder that some of those 'silly' gifts had rather direct causal links to both the Arcology Shutdown and Crash 2.0.

I disagree.

The only connection between Dunkelzahn's Will and the Renraku Seattle Arcology shutdown is that Dunkelzahn gave Fuchi security head Miles Lanier a seat on Renraku board of directors, giving Lanier accesses he used to channel intelligence to its former boss and friend Richard Villiers which may have included evidence of clandestine operations led against Fuchi Industrial Electronics, allowing Fuchi to file a complaint with the Corporate Court, whose incoming investigation prompted Renraku top scientist "Brightlight" to leave after erasing a large number of archives, which may have contributed to Renraku AI developers failure to properly control the arcology expert program.

That's as direct as you can link the will to the shutdown, and I wouldn't call giving a Fuchi top executive some Renraku stock a silly gift (besides, I'm not any sourcebook ever formally spelled out a connection between Brightlight and AEP project; it is, as far as I know, an assumption).

The will has a slightly less tenuous connection with the Second Crash, as the aforementioned 34 billion dollar bequest was used to fund a operations against Novatech, leading to a major financial event that was instrumental in the coming of the Crash.

[Reaver]

And the first ever Thor strike assassination...

[The Wyrm Ouroboros]

I knew they were involved I just thought it was more move a claw here . . . . change of stocks there . . . . new ceo over here with new direction . . . employees given reduncancy . . . change of stock around here . . .. achievement of goal. I didn't realize they all already had mouthpieces who could speak for their goals directly to a company with a few expections e.g. Loftwyr.

Conceptualization check.

Dragons - okay, Great Dragons - do not typically have a mouthpiece whose purpose it is is to call up, say, HKB and say, "I want you researching Gummi Worms."  (Lesser dragons might, but that's because they haven't achieved the level of subtlety that most GDs utilize.  Lofwyr is a significant exception - but he uses his subtlety for events outside his corporation.)  Most Great Dragons act in exactly the manner you describe.  A suggestion is made via their Voice to an individual.  That individual mentions that suggestion to another individual, who in turn mentions it to a third, who comments about 'a suggestion they heard' to a Head of Research, a CFO, a CEO, a VP of Operations, whatever.  Something - whatever the GD desired - happens, but with a) enough distance to give him plausable deniability, and yet with b) the people in the know - all of the individuals in the chain - knowing exactly where the 'suggestion' came from.  (You can bet that the individuals in that chain are VERY certain to be specific as to whether a suggestion is their own, or something 'from someone they were talking to', meaning 'links in the chain to the Boss'.)

Lung and Ryumyo are well-known in the shadows for having their claws inside specific Chinese or Japanese megacorporations; in the bright light of the SINner, it's far more obscure, because the shadows pay more attention to that sort of thing, and SINners find it much easier to scoff at what are 'obviously' conspiracy theories.  That doesn't make them try to appear unrelated to controlling a corporate interest or three.

That's as direct as you can link the will to the shutdown, and I wouldn't call giving a Fuchi top executive some Renraku stock a silly gift (besides, I'm not any sourcebook ever formally spelled out a connection between Brightlight and AEP project; it is, as far as I know, an assumption).

Bzzzt, thank you for playing. 

The trapdoor leads directly into a UV host created by the elf Leonardo to watch over the SCIRE Matrix and see if any AIs developed.  The Big D somehow learned of it and arranged in his will for someone to find and reveal the information collected by the various programs running on the host.

Leonardo is, of course, Brightlight.

[Senko]

Ah I see where my suggestion could work. Put the drake acting as per my original post in the second or third step of your chain rather than at the end. Great Dragon directs mouthpiece, mouthpiece relays directions to trusted pawn, trusted pawn relay's it to drake, drake relays it to intermediary, intermediary relays to approrpiate target, appropraite target offers suggestion to corporation.

[The Wyrm Ouroboros]

Drakes tend to be used more as close assets than as, well, that, unless the drake is a social adept, in which case they get used as ... close assets in social situations.  (A 'close asset' being different than a 'deniable asset'.)

Drakes are a) rare, b) valueable, and c) usually powerful (proportionately, anyhow).  Since AFAIK it requires the Great Dragon in person to do whatever it is GDs do to drakes to claim them, it really only makes sense that subsequently the drake(s) would be working personally and, even if not directly, at most one stage removed from The Boss, along with frequent meet-and-greets.  A drake might not be the corporate Chief Blank Officer to the Great Dragon's CEO/President, but he's at least a senior VP, and probably reports back to the GD directly, and in person.

So while your situation would normally be GD to voice to corporate relation manager to corporate cut-out to senior VP to CEO of corporation, if the Great Dragon needed to get a message to the senior VP or the CEO very quickly - or, more likely, with special emphasis - the drake shows up and says, "My master bids me say to you, the path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he who, in the name of charity and good will, shepherds the weak through the valley of the darkness. For he is truly his brother's keeper and the finder of lost children. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to poison and destroy my brothers. And you will know I am the Lord when I lay my vengeance upon you."  And the CEO knows that he hath done wrong, and goeth forth, and sins no more.

... sorry.  Tarantino swiped my keyboard for a second there.

But the drake shows up and passes a message along - directly but indirectly, because he'd never say who his master was, everything about him would scream 'It's X!!'  From his manner of dress, to his behavior, to his way of moving, his mode of address, everything.  Or perhaps they'll refer to the 'voting bloc' their master controls.  "The Master of the Wu-Tang Clan says ..." or 'the CEO of Trans-Latvian Enterprises desires ...' or whatever.  Anyone who tracks such things passionately knows who is being X, Y, and/or Z, and you can bet that even if Damien Knight doesn't know the moment he wakes up with the drake standing at his bedside, he'll have a precis waiting for him next to his morning Cinnabon (TM, owned by Focus Brands, an affiliate of private equity firm Roark Capital Group, an Ares America subsidiary).

[Senko]

Really the fluff didn't give the impression that Drakes were that important to dragons or usually their hit men (that is what you meant by close asset?), much less rare/valuable/powerful.

[cold iron]

Opti over at the neo-anarcist douse a good job of giving us the history including the big picture stuff. Going from his aztechology feed Bid D did have a big chuck of there stock so it's easy to say yes to the OP's theory. His will was able to put 2 people on boards of directors of AAA corps not to mention a few louse stocks such as 1% of Ares for some of the mars data.

As to some of the silly stuff in the will I still think the best one was the gift to the current holder of the patent for stovetop popcorn.

[Nath]

That's as direct as you can link the will to the shutdown, and I wouldn't call giving a Fuchi top executive some Renraku stock a silly gift (besides, I'm not any sourcebook ever formally spelled out a connection between Brightlight and AEP project; it is, as far as I know, an assumption).

Bzzzt, thank you for playing. 

The trapdoor leads directly into a UV host created by the elf Leonardo to watch over the SCIRE Matrix and see if any AIs developed.  The Big D somehow learned of it and arranged in his will for someone to find and reveal the information collected by the various programs running on the host.

I was thinking of a connection in the sense that Brightlight would have been involved in the AEP project. This part just says Brightlight knew about the AEP project (as pretty much anyone as far as 2050 if the Seattle Sourcebook was any indication) and hacked a toilet system controller inside the arcology so as to hide a probe to secretly monitor the AEP. Or there is also a connection between the GRU and the Democrats.

Besides, Dunkelzahn knew about this probe and wrote about it in its will before his death on August 9th, 2057. Brightlight did not start to work with Renraku before May 2057. It is far from certain that Renraku would invite loony hacker Brightlight to work on its most advanced project within three months. So the probe, if it certainly shows Brightlight was interested (or at least intrigued) by the AEP, may well have been installed before any actual involvement. Possibly even before the beginning of his cooperation with Renraku, which might explain why Brightlight willingly gave that corporation a bonus hint to find him when he hacked all the Big Ten.

How Dunkelzahn even knew about the existence of a probe hidden by the supposedly best hacker in the world inside a system operated by a third party is left as an exercise to the reader.

[The Wyrm Ouroboros]

Really the fluff didn't give the impression that Drakes were that important to dragons or usually their hit men (that is what you meant by close asset?), much less rare/valuable/powerful.

I actually got the exact opposite impression.  There's a whole 'drake hunt' by the Great Dragons back during the Comet; when a drake first 'erupts' into his drake form, it sends out a subtle astral pulse that Great Dragons can detect, and they'll send assets (attributable, deniable, or otherwise) to shanghai the drake and bring them to him.  In fact, in 3e if you wanted to be a drake, you either automatically received (without any bonus for it) a 6-point Hunted Flaw (Negative Quality), or else you had to purchase 'Dragon Patron' (a 6-point Edge/Positive Quality) to offset it, indicating that you'd basically already been caught and claimed by one of the Great Dragons (or under the protection of someone equally powerful).

And I kind of tried to explain what I meant by 'close asset'; hit man, troubleshooter, personal observer, aide de camp, however you want to put it - and, in turn, whatever the Great Dragon requires at the time.  Wants somebody to go to a shareholder meeting, make a speech, and then vote his proxies in a certain way?  Wants someone to pay a 'social call' on Rowena O'Malley?  Wants someone to slip into the home and 'lean upon' the CFO of Hisako-Turner in the middle of the night?  Wants someone to deliver a freshly-made grouping of chocolate-raspberry trifles from Le Cinq in Paris to Zebulon and Ghostwalker in their Denver FRFZ home on Christmas Eve?  All of these might be something a close asset - someone clearly and distinctly (and just as importantly, closely) associated with the individual, even if they might not be legally associated - might be called upon to do.

It is far from certain that Renraku would invite loony hacker Brightlight to work on its most advanced project within three months. So the probe, if it certainly shows Brightlight was interested (or at least intrigued) by the AEP, may well have been installed before any actual involvement. Possibly even before the beginning of his cooperation with Renraku, which might explain why Brightlight willingly gave that corporation a bonus hint to find him when he hacked all the Big Ten.

How Dunkelzahn even knew about the existence of a probe hidden by the supposedly best hacker in the world inside a system operated by a third party is left as an exercise to the reader.

Ah, forgot about the timing.  However, let me give you a couple of points:

First, Brightlight would have been fascinated by AI.  Morgan had been around since 2050, when Twist and Dodger tripped over her and became her X-Factor; Brightlight would have at the very least been aware of her, and been intrigued by the possibilities.  I can thus see him creating and hiding the toilet-flushing-observatory (which IMO does not appear to be an actual 'standard' part of the AEP architecture) in the Arcology's AEP-external Matrix.  I agree completely with you that he might well have - okay, probably - created the thing well before the Big 8 ultrahack.

Second, just because Renraku may not have placed him directly on the project doesn't mean Brightlight wouldn't've contributed to its peripherals, though at least not its 'core loyalty' code. I can very easily see him sending multiple messages to the AEP programmers suggesting, 'Have you tried this?' or 'Saw the code you were struggling with, see if this patch (PATCH) works.'  Brightlight's disappearance at the end of whatever book it was forced Renraku to have to reverse-engineer a LOT of stuff - and Brightlight was the person who'd touched all that stuff.  That he could have had a hand (however subtle) in the AEP's programming is possible at the very least, and IMO virtually impossible not to be a certainty.

As for whether or not the Big D's will being 'a cause', well ... see this post, this post, and this post.  (Reading Citizen Joe's posts in-between may be amusing, but he's well beyond 'left field'.)

[Senko]

I have no played 3rd ed or read that bit about the comet . . .

I kind of wish they'd kept that positive quality in 5th ed as I can see games where you'd want something to offset the required wanted for games where you playing a claimed drake.

[The Wyrm Ouroboros]

Hey, if you're the GM, make it so.