What specific houserules and optional rules are you using? For what specific purpose?
Are you looking to create a survival-horror feel where resources are stretched from the start and direct engagement is often a bad plan, or are you looking to go straight to horror-action (AKA, where all survival-horror ends up given enough time) where the enemy is pants-crappingly terrifying but the characters can and should take them on?
Shutdown, from what I've heard, has a reputation for taking out PC's - have you planned for that, and adjusted for the now fully wireless Matrix (and, for that matter, technomancers replacing otaku)?
What happened when you failed the party? It would help if we could look at specific factors in this that you might have overlooked (we're never the best judges of our own failures, at least not without both qualitative and quantitative data on the subject).
What's the group composition look like, or do you know yet?
Are you going to have much means for the party to get new gear, skills, and to initiate/submerge in this campaign? How much Karma do you expect them to earn before the final run of this adventure?
And I suggest drop bears if any of your players are reading.
Sorry for taking days to post a response (life can get crazy sometimes
) I hope I have answered these questions adequately. And thanks for responding and helping a noob.
What specific houserules and optional rules are you using? For what specific purpose?
The specific optional rules I am using are the armor rules from arsenal page 44 all of them. I am also allowing high strength to effect recoil. The reason are for balance with the armor to keep people from making the armor that is resistant to everything and limiting how much gear they can have within the armor. I like the idea that a stronger person could withstand the recoil so I put it in out of preference. Most of the house rules that effect the party directly are that I give out a lot more karma, money, and I don't require them to seek out a trainer to improve skills and I play character advancement by ear time wise. This is a high power group that started out with 500 bp, availability 16, and could spend up to 100 bp on nuyen. I also changed the time it takes to modify and make programs because the times can be ridiculous. Other than that I ban most WAR materials with some exceptions.
The big house rules I am doing is that I am fucking with the shadowrun lore and going into so grey areas for the rules. When it comes to the rules, the enemies (at least most of them) have essences less than 0 while on being true cyber zombies. The reason for this is to one increase the creepy factor (cyber drones as I call them are near brain dead), two it could help make the mundane enemies resit the two mages in the group from mind probing them and spoiling all the twists, and three it makes more sense for the 5 A.I. within the facility to use what they have available (a population of around 20,000 people, the facility is doing research into medical fields and cyberware, and meta-humans are able to adapt to changing scenarios and can preform a larger group of tasks much more efficiently then drones.) When it comes to the lore...I am bring Deus back...kind of. This facility had most of its systems controlled by 6 different A.I.s that are kept in check by a very powerful technomancer (originally an otaku that was part of the network, containing a chunk of Megaera) that has been partially wired into the network of these 6 A.I.s. 5 of the 6 A.I.s were based on chucks of Deus that survived crash 2.0. The last chunk was part of Mirage. There is one final A.I. in this facility, one that was the surviving chunk of Megaera within the technomancer. This A.I. is fragmented as part of it was still contained within the technomancer. This A.I. is also a Chekhov's gun character and a way for me to get information to the party. This A.I. I have dubbed Nybble and he is based on Stark from Farscape but much less annoying. The party before the campaign started receiving messages in a weird way, long story short it contains the last fragments of code. They will be meeting this guy once they enter the facility right after they defeat the first cyber drone they meet. Somehow either they will figure out the code is his and give it to him or he is poking around one of their comlinks and he is drawn to the code like a bug to a light. Once he touches it, he reabsorb some of the code and he has some flashbacks but doesn't tell the party what he saw (it is his birth moment which was extremely painful for him). Overtime more and more of the code is reintegrated and he becomes more and more calm and more helpful to the party. While this is happening overtime he occasionally picks up information from passing Cyber Drone or is contacted by the A.I.s.
Are you looking to create a survival-horror feel where resources are stretched from the start and direct engagement is often a bad plan, or are you looking to go straight to horror-action (AKA, where all survival-horror ends up given enough time) where the enemy is pants-crappingly terrifying but the characters can and should take them on?
A mix of both, the enemies as I have already stated are already dead and they are being kept alive through artificial means for the more creepy atmosphere. More of the survival horror aspect at least in the beginning but sometimes direct combat is a good course of action where as most of the time the enemy is moving in larger groups or they can hear some of the more dangerous enemies moving around in the area. Though I only plan them to be in this more cut off from the rest of the world feeling for several sessions until they can get to the motor pool area within the surface part of this facility and blow the doors where they will get a resupply and more forces enter into the facility. From there they can take the more aggressive approach but it still isn't the best idea because of some of the experiments that have been taking place deep within the lower levels of the facility
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Shutdown, from what I've heard, has a reputation for taking out PC's - have you planned for that, and adjusted for the now fully wireless Matrix (and, for that matter, technomancers replacing otaku)?
This isn't the Renraku Arcology Shutdown page for page. This campaign is only loosely based on it and has parallels to it. I have planned for it, the group is composed of a lot of stealth. Both mages have improved invisibility, one of the main combat characters is an infiltrator, and the hacker/rigger has his drone set for stealth. When it comes to the wireless matrix, it is there it is just jammed, encrypted, and FUBAR'ed to shit. The hacker can access local nodes within range of his signal, but it doesn't really connect to anything else unless he wants to have to fight through an army of Black IC and possible one of the A.I.s. And I have added some Techomancers but at this facility they are rare because of the technomancer being used to keep the A.I. in check. The party isn't alone in the fight against the 5 Dues based A.I.s. One group is the population that isn't dead, converted into one of the drones, or imprisoned. The second group is a bunch of Cyber Drones know as the Renegades. They are controlled by the A.I. based on Mirage. The third and final group is probably the most powerful know as the Liberators. They aren't controlled like the other Drone, they still have their personality mostly; instead they are commanded by the Technomacer loosely but mainly act on their own free will and desire to save the people who are still trapped within the facility from the 5. They were rescued by the Technomancer from the 5 before they could be fully converted. They were all test subjects prior to the lock down, having type O systems and had bodies that accepted cyberware and bioware. The A.I.s had already begun processing them when the Technomancer was able to send them to a secret medic facility built deep within the facility and repaired what damage she could. They are now the most powerful of the Cyber Drones (they are only called this because their cyberware is set up similarly to that of the other Drones) having the ability to block out the 5's control signals and override the programing put into the Cyber Drones.
What happened when you failed the party? It would help if we could look at specific factors in this that you might have overlooked (we're never the best judges of our own failures, at least not without both qualitative and quantitative data on the subject).
I failed the party in the fact that I didn't think out the twist well enough causing too many plot holes and cause two of the five to become extremely unhappy about the campaign. The cause was I didn't spend enough time leading up to the twist and it felt railroady to some and to the other though it was a little contrived. I personal believe that the problem has been solved because I have planned out a lot more and going to give more hints as to the few twists that I have in mind.
What's the group composition look like, or do you know yet?
-Technomancer, Info savant
-Hacker/Rigger, Focus more on Hacking, built for exploit as well, drones built for stealth and indirect combat using long range and cover fire for other characters, also has a lot of logic links skills (everything except vet tech all have a dice pool of at least ten O.o)
-Combat Mage, Has many AOE combat spells, also has some melee skills and stealth abilities
-Illusionist Mage, Multiple spells that can be used to cover the party or distract enemies
-Infiltrator/Face, Built for melee combat and sneaking around, has some face skills that will help the party when they meet up with some of the forces that oppose the A.I., also has B/E skill to bypass doors and security systems
Are you going to have much means for the party to get new gear, skills, and to initiate/submerge in this campaign? How much Karma do you expect them to earn before the final run of this adventure?
Skills and initiate/submerge, not so much because the events that happen within the facility will only last about 3 weeks in game time. When it comes to gear, they can find quite a bit throughout the facility and if they work with the resistance, The Renegades (Cyber Drones under the command of the A.I. based on Mirage), and the Liberators they can get access to rarer gear. Karma total for this arc of a large campaign will be somewhere in the neighborhood of 40 or more (I give out a lot more karma then recommended allotment from the book, high power campaign).
