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JT Jag posted:It's a bit more complex seeing as on a certain level Racter is Koschei Yes but on a certain other level Koschei has an emergent-intelligence seperate from Racter. I'm picturing it wearing the cat costume and gleefully prowling around the rustbucket pouncing on things.
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Nov 11, 2022 07:58
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Podima posted:Welcome back! Glad you like them, I added the gifs and have been including PRECISE NUMBERS since I'd like to see that kind of thing myself and they do say you should always write for yourself, plus apparently because I like to add feature creep to an already massively delayed LP. Being vague about the mechanics of abilities is one of my eternal pet peeves in RPGs, like I had no idea Rotary Saw and its "Greatly boosted critical hit chance" was so mediocre until now that I've been digging into the ability data externally. Realistically it's likely more effort than it's worth especially since the story and dialogue are the main attraction here, but it's also fun to figure out and show off how these kinds of things really work, plus there's only three more crew levels to go in the game anyway. citybeatnik posted:The Philippino SL convo is easily one of my favorites, coupled with the drone costume one. Yeah, RatStar123 is Gobbet. That thread only appears if Racter is recruited, and the line about having Red Samurai armor as reference is only included if Gaichu is recruited as well. The Shadowland BBS was always fun to read in Dragonfall but it definitely peaks in Hong Kong. JustJeff88 posted:I'm rather sad to say that, at the start of this update, it took me several minutes to remember the previous run that the first screenshot was referencing. Been a while. Show off more of the game? Have some mercy  Money is tight in the game for sure, but I can't really think of instances where it'd be some major obstacle to showing off anything interesting. There's very little we can't work our way around in LP form anyway though.On the subject of money, the payment for the run does vary depending on how thorough you were with your looting, we got ¥1900 for looting at least 10000 nuyen's worth of stuff, you get ¥1600 for looting at least 5000 nuyen's worth of stuff, and ¥1300 otherwise if you totally slacked off. The loading screen text and Drake's email change a bit depending on how thorough you were too, but not by enough to be worth showing off separately.
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Nov 11, 2022 10:35
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Ah, didn't know it was that context specific kamfy. That's cool! She has multiple accounts as well I think. blizzardvizard posted:Glad to see this updated! Gaichu's also blind so it kind of makes sense for him to not have any at the start (and explains why the upgrade has such short range)... but then the dude can also toss out grenades with no problems so hell if I know.
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Nov 11, 2022 14:03
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Kanfy posted:Show off more of the game? Have some mercy citybeatnik posted:Gaichu's also blind so it kind of makes sense for him to not have any at the start (and explains why the upgrade has such short range)... but then the dude can also toss out grenades with no problems so hell if I know.
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Nov 11, 2022 15:46
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Gaichu is blind but perceives astrally, so he can see targets well enough.
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Nov 11, 2022 15:53
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Kanfy posted:and have been including PRECISE NUMBERS since I'd like to see that kind of thing myself I really appreciate these too. Seeing the actual numbers on why some of my level-up choices were really good and/or bad is really cool.
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Nov 12, 2022 08:30
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Really goes to show that good writing can carry not just mediocre gameplay but in some cases also poorly thought (not to mention entirely unexplained) design choices.
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Nov 12, 2022 13:04
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Glad to see this is back, and looking forward to more. Hopefully you do my favorite run next.
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Nov 12, 2022 22:09
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Kanfy posted:Realistically it's likely more effort than it's worth especially since the story and dialogue are the main attraction here, but it's also fun to figure out and show off how these kinds of things really work, plus there's only three more crew levels to go in the game anyway. +1 to being glad to see a post and getting the numberwang spelled out 
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Nov 13, 2022 00:44
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The chat between participants on Shadowlands BBS *is* Shadowrun to me. It’s 99% of the appeal of the splat books and among the best bits of the games.
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Nov 13, 2022 01:33
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Glad to see this back. Also, that newscast was interesting. Never really thought of the concept of awakened weather phenomena, but it does make sense in SR's world. Has the lore actually clarified whether the newscaster's "scientists say they don't have any animosity towards people" is true? Do other more forms of weather have awakened forms as well - rain or thunderstorms or blizzards or etc?
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Nov 13, 2022 02:25
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MagusofStars posted:Glad to see this back. Look closer, that was newspeak. The anchor didn't say scientists say the don't have animosity to metahumans, she said scientists have never found proof they have animosity to metahumans. Now, two questions: How the gently caress would you check that in the first place? And who the gently caress is going to fly into the middle of an intelligent category five hurricane with magical powers that may or may not be actively trying to kill you to do the checking? And you do have to fly into it. Awakened typhoons don't make landfall. They're fully aware that kills storms and are normally quite happy to hang around just offshore where they can feed from the ocean and storm on the ground dwellers. Which is why most shadowrunners love the things. Days or even weeks of horrific unbroken storm weather means every big system grinds to a halt and breaks down. You know what's easier than hitting a secure office? Hitting a secure office where the power's out, all communications are down, everyone's starving, and the security team has been on shift for ninety loving hours straight because their next shift can't get to the building. This is right about the point in the cycle where suppliers triple their prices, runners stockpile supplies, and fixers line up every job they can get. The folks on shadowlands were not joking at all when they mentioned "high operational tempo" and "running season"
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Nov 13, 2022 06:38
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The thread lives! Also echoing that I like lifting the lid on what the skills actually do. Beefeater1980 posted:The chat between participants on Shadowlands BBS *is* Shadowrun to me. It’s 99% of the appeal of the splat books and among the best bits of the games. Yeah it really isn’t cyberpunk without a bunch of pleasingly anachronistic usenet threads.
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Nov 13, 2022 07:34
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Stroth posted:Look closer, that was newspeak. The anchor didn't say scientists say the don't have animosity to metahumans, she said scientists have never found proof they have animosity to metahumans. Now, two questions: How the gently caress would you check that in the first place? And who the gently caress is going to fly into the middle of an intelligent category five hurricane with magical powers that may or may not be actively trying to kill you to do the checking? And you do have to fly into it. Awakened typhoons don't make landfall. They're fully aware that kills storms and are normally quite happy to hang around just offshore where they can feed from the ocean and storm on the ground dwellers. That's all very interesting additional context, thanks.
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Nov 13, 2022 08:15
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Very excited to see new posts here. Also I adore the mechanical explanations and the choice reasonings, I love learning about game systems and how builds shake out.
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Nov 13, 2022 09:28
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Beefeater1980 posted:The chat between participants on Shadowlands BBS *is* Shadowrun to me. It’s 99% of the appeal of the splat books and among the best bits of the games. Yeah, the conversations between Shadowtalkers in the splat books always make the universe feel more lived in, and some of the storylines that the JackPoint crew generate from those few lines of text make for interesting reading and help at lot with characterization of this otherwise anonymous collection of runners and people in the business.
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Nov 13, 2022 19:16
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Still, it's a bit annoying that we still haven't been able to kill Clockwork, sell his organs to Tamamous, and parade his skull around like a trophy despite him showing up in scenarios twice. I can dream, though. 
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Nov 14, 2022 00:44
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TheDavies posted:Still, it's a bit annoying that we still haven't been able to kill Clockwork, sell his organs to Tamamous, and parade his skull around like a trophy despite him showing up in scenarios twice. I can dream, though. I cannot tell you how many oligarchs and politicians I have had that same dream about. Fits the theme of Shadowrun, surely.
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Nov 14, 2022 02:25
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Stroth posted:Look closer, that was newspeak. The anchor didn't say scientists say the don't have animosity to metahumans, she said scientists have never found proof they have animosity to metahumans. Now, two questions: How the gently caress would you check that in the first place? And who the gently caress is going to fly into the middle of an intelligent category five hurricane with magical powers that may or may not be actively trying to kill you to do the checking? And you do have to fly into it. Awakened typhoons don't make landfall. They're fully aware that kills storms and are normally quite happy to hang around just offshore where they can feed from the ocean and storm on the ground dwellers. 
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Nov 14, 2022 03:32
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TheDavies posted:Still, it's a bit annoying that we still haven't been able to kill Clockwork, sell his organs to Tamamous, and parade his skull around like a trophy despite him showing up in scenarios twice. I can dream, though. NetCat has dibs, I think. ... Also, while I loathe him for the rear end in a top hat he is, I am somewhat reluctantly impressed that he's managed to survive so far.
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Nov 14, 2022 09:12
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Is NetCat the one who likes toasters?
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Nov 14, 2022 10:58
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NetCat's a technomancer. Which means that if she likes toasters, the toasters like her back.
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Nov 14, 2022 11:39
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TheDavies posted:Still, it's a bit annoying that we still haven't been able to kill Clockwork, sell his organs to Tamamous, and parade his skull around like a trophy despite him showing up in scenarios twice. I can dream, though. Didn't he get killed and replaced by the braineating AI from the previous game? (Not sure the etiquette for Dragonfall spoilers since it was the previous game/LP)
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Nov 23, 2022 10:42
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The Lone Badger posted:Didn't he get killed and replaced by the braineating AI from the previous game? That wasn’t the Clockwork we’re referencing. Clockwork is a still very active and infamously anti-technomancer Hobgoblin Rigger from the Balkans on JackPoint, the one on the Shadowland BBS in Dragonfall was someone who used the same handle. kaosdrachen posted:NetCat has dibs, I think. Poil posted:Is NetCat the one who likes toasters? kaosdrachen posted:NetCat's a technomancer. So a common slur against technomancers is toaster lover/fucker, so it’s been thrown at NetCat a couple of times, yes. There was a short story in one of the Shadowrun books (I want to say it was in 5th Edition’s Run Harder?) where NetCat found a poorly written fanfiction of her actually having a sexual relationship with a toaster floating around on the Matrix, and she enlisted her live in boyfriend/baby daddy Slamm-O!, a decker of major repute who became one of the three sysops of JackPoint when FastJack had to retire and wander the earth after he got infected with Crash Fragmentation Disorder, to help her purge the Matrix of any copies, with him taking the physical side and her the technomancer route, by blocking his pirated access to the trid of the Mariners games until he helped her (Slamm-O is a massive baseball fan, as evidenced by his handle). And yes, NetCat has first dibs against Clockwork, since he tried to sell her and her unborn baby to Mitsuhama as part of their technomancer bounty. Slamm-O has second dibs since it was his baby; FastJack maybe has third, since the baby was named after him.
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Nov 23, 2022 14:34
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The Lone Badger posted:Didn't he get killed and replaced by the braineating AI from the previous game? Talking about whatever happened in the previous games is fine, just avoid spoilers for this one.
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Nov 23, 2022 17:09
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Part 25 - Sink or Swim  Duncan's busy with his morning workouts and Is0bel is figuratively and literally absorbed in her computer right now, so neither of them are willing to engage us in our usual post-run socializing. So, going down the list, it's Gobbet who we'll be catching up with today.    Anyway. Enough about the boat.[She puts her hands on her hips, sending Madness scurrying.] Ready for your next lesson? Or did you just want to chat?Y'know in hindsight we might've gotten a bit carried off with that name choice, maybe something more subtle would've been better what with us being a foreigner hiding from the law and all...  Is it too late to change the name of the boat? 'Fraid so, Seattle. Everyone's gotten pretty attached to it... we all like the Big Texas just fine as she is. Besides, I've already painted her name on the side of the hull. But what if I don't like it anymore? That's tough. Have you ever painted a boat before? No? Then stop talking. It took me two hours and a whole roll of butcher paper to cut that stupid stencil, and I'm not making another one.To be honest we've never even been to Texas. Probably worrying about nothing though, could be that a simple and boring name would only stand out more in this neighborhood, like you were trying too hard in some weird reverse way. Any thoughts about that last run? I think 'never trust a mummy' is probably one of life's unwritten rules. Have you ever seen a trid or sim where the mummy was a good guy? *I* haven't. And an awesome sword is probably a better bet in the long run than a favor from a dead guy. What if he started running around cursing everybody when we let him out? You made the right choice.(Alternatively, had we taken the mummy's deal of smuggling it out and getting its summoning fetish instead of its sword:) quote:
So, what else did you want to chat about? I'm ready for my next lesson.In our previous lesson our shadowrunning mentor recounted the tale of how her Macau team failed to heed Gobbet's warnings and burned to death in a fire which she herself had started while trying to create a distraction that'd let them escape the scene after an apartment break-in job gone bad. It was apparently a lesson of the importance of going with your instincts. Or something, frankly the part about the horrible fiery deaths of her teammates ended up being the most memorable part. Yeah?[She smiles.] That's good. I was hoping that you'd want to keep going with this. It's good for you, and I'm kind of enjoying it, too. All right. This is gonna be another long story, so I'm thinking we should take it in chunks. If you've got any questions, you can ask 'em along the way, and if you need to take a break we can come back to it. Sound good? However you wanna do it is fine by me. Good. So last time, I told you about the event that brought an end to my illustrious career as a subcontractor. This time, I’m gonna tell you about a run that I went on with my regular team. Nightjar’s team, you mean? Was this where you started running with Is0bel? No. This was long before I hooked up with them. Izz was still learning to deck back then. She was good for her age, but she wasn't ready for prime time. And it'd be another couple of years before I'd meet Nightjar or Auntie Cheng. You don't know anyone from the group that I'm talking about. They’re all gone now, anyway.What, was Nightjar getting his lid popped open in front of us just the latest in an ongoing series of increasingly dramatic party wipes? Should we be concerned about this trend? You've had a rough career, haven't you? Yeah... I guess that I have. But I'm still alive. That's something. Puts me ahead of a lot of other runners I've known. The truth of the matter is, as runners, dying on the job is an occupational hazard. We're disposable assets. It shouldn't come as a surprise when we get used up and tossed away. Guess it was the same way in the Barrens. Here today, gone tomorrow. Yeah. You know how it is. People die, and it's sad, but there's no sense moping about it. Tell me about the team that you were running with. Our muscle was a Hawaiian Jew with poor impulse control. Big, round guy with lumberjack arms and ringlets in his hair. He called himself "Honu." I guess that he loved turtles? I dunno, street names are weird. We also had a tech specialist, Egret... she was tall, gawky, dyed her hair bone white. She had a drone named Arlo that followed her around like a lost puppy. She was kind of a jack of all trades, but she could get the job done. Fun at parties, too. Our de facto team leader was a guy named Tsui. He was a wiry troll, if you can imagine that... probably about two percent body fat, all skin and bones. Walked with a hunch to make himself look smaller. He was a shaman. Followed Rat, like me. There can't be many troll Rat shamans out there. Not that I've met. But Tsui seemed like a really good guy. We got along fine. I actually really liked everyone on the team. They were a lot of fun to run with. Sure sounds like an interesting group of people. It was. But then, everyone I've worked with has been interesting in his or her own way. As a rule, shadowrunning isn't a profession that attracts boring people.Ours was more like the gravitational kind of attraction, just minding our business one moment and the next we were suddenly falling down into a hole littered with hungry dreams and angry cops. So how did you meet this group of yours? Through mutual friends. We actually all lived together before we decided to start running as a team. There was this floating squatters' commune out in Hung Hom Bay. It's probably still out there, actually... I haven't been back in a long time. But I spent a few years living on the thing, and the rest of the team lived there with me. You lived on a... what, a raft? Really, someone named a raft the "Sinking Ship"? And here we were doubting our own naming sense... might there be a story behind that one? I'd like to hear more about the Sinking Ship. Let's hold off on that for a little bit, okay? I'd like to get through the rest of this story before we spend any more time on the raft. After your lesson's over, I'll tell you whatever you wanna know about the commune, but for now I'd rather not get sidetracked. Okay, I think that I've got a grasp on the team dynamic. Keep going.[She nods.] All right. Moving on. So one day, Tsui brought us a job. He'd met a client in a Victoria Harbour bar, a rich Eastern Tiger exec. The guy wanted us to steal something for him. A "shiny object."[She raises her hands.] I know, I know. It's stupid, right? But that was how the Johnson described it to us. The Shiny Object. That was what he wanted us to get. He never gave it any other name. Seriously? A Rat shaman hired to steal a shiny object? Yeah. You can see how the gig would be hard for us to resist. Likely a good rule of thumb with magical talismans attached to things in general, not really something people stick on random pieces of junk for the added aesthetic value. The client also told us about the Shiny Object's then owner: an old hedge wizard-turned-entrepreneur named Kong Xiuyan. Hedge wizard?[She nods.] He had the whole "wise old sage" thing going on. He had the robes, the little hat, the kind smile. Oh, and the pièce de résistance - a long, wispy beard. He was mean as a snake though, and had a rep to prove it. Intel said that old man Xiuyan was keeping the Shiny Object in one of his warehouses. He had a bunch of them - he'd built himself a nice little empire selling magical paraphernalia through puppet vendors in the Yau Ma Tei night market. Supposedly, a good fifth of the stalls in that place were on Xiuyan's payroll. Yeah? What kinds of magical paraphernalia are we talking about?[She begins counting off examples on her fingers.] Pickled reagents in mason jars. Hermetic scrolls and charms. Relics looted from Buddhist temples, crates of old Balinese Rangda masks, and fist-sized stones from a Great Dragon's kidney. Xiuyan sold it all. How he got his hands on it in the first place is anyone's guess. Some of that stuff sounds valuable.Just gonna assume the demand for dragon kidney stones is some kinda fetish thing. And not the summoning kind. Yeah... I'm sure that some of it was. Most of it was crap, though. Fakes and forgeries to sell to gullible tourists. Sifting the good stuff from the bad would've taken time, and we weren't planning on sticking around long enough to do that. Fair enough. Tsui was the one who came up with the plan. We'd split up outside and enter the warehouse in two teams. Team A would create a diversion. Team B would hit the vault while security was looking the other way. We'd grab our payday, regroup, and get the hell out of there. In my experience, splitting the group is almost always more trouble than it's worth. I'd agree with you if we were going in expecting a straight fight. But as a shadowrunner, you should almost never want to get into one of those. When you're on a job, you're always gonna be outnumbered and outgunned. Going quiet is inherently safer than going loud, and if splitting the group is what it takes to do that...[She shrugs.] Anyway, Team A - Honu and Egret - circled around to the loading dock, just like we'd planned. Tsui and I waited by the service entrance. drat, wonder if it's too late the quit the mystic arts and pick up rigging instead? Maybe Racter could do that kind of thing... The next time we're on a run with a loading dock, remind me about the forklift trick. It's awesome, right?[A dreamy smile spreads across her face.] Egret really outdid herself. I wish that I could've been there to see it. Anyway, Egret's distraction did what it was supposed to do. As Tsui and I watched, most of the triad guys at the service entrance abandoned their posts and went hauling off toward the loading dock. A couple guys with baseball bats stayed back, but we handled them easily enough. We slipped inside and made a beeline for the back of the warehouse, where the Shiny Object was supposed to be. Let me guess. Something went wrong. No, actually. It was there, just like we thought it'd be. The door was open and everything. The Shiny Object was sitting there in a teak cradle, gleaming with reflected light. Just like the client had said, it had a ring of Taoist talismans hanging off of it like a grass skirt, the paper all crinkled with age. We didn't waste any time. I reached in and grabbed the thing. It felt strange through my gloves. The jade sort of, uh... pulsed. As if it had a heartbeat. That sounds ominous. Did the Shiny Object do something unpredictable? No. Not the Shiny Object. Old Man Xiuyan. He was standing there, right in front of us, larger than life. I'm guessing that when he heard the commotion in the loading dock, he'd come running - well, waddling - to make sure that his treasure was safe. As it turns out, it wasn't, because I'd already stolen the thing. He looked displeased. So what'd you do? What do you think we did? He had our backs to a wall, we lit the old bastard up. It was pretty epic, truth be told. Spirits were summoned, spells were discharged. The vault door sealed behind Xiuyan like something out of a movie. At one point, the old man leapt onto Tsui's back and tried to bite his ear off. I won't bore you with a play-by-play of how the fight went down. In the end, we crushed him. Unfortunately, the fighting had caused some collateral damage. At some point during our showdown with Xiuyan, the control panel for the vault door must've eaten an arc of lightning or the blast of a powerball. It was toast, all black and melted. And neither of us could fix it. So you were trapped in the vault?If we were in a shadowrunning team and did something as embarrassing as getting trapped in the same vault we were in there to rob, we'd either quit in shame the next day or at least make sure nobody was left as a witness to tell anyone about it. Never thought that's a thing that's actually happened to someone... Yeah. That's about the size of it. And it was only a matter of time before the old man's remaining security guys found us in there. There was still one way out, a ventilation duct, up high in the rafters. But it was too small for Tsui to fit through... he was a troll, after all. I had the Shiny Object. But if I left Tsui there and security got to him, well... you do the math. I can stay with Tsui to help fight off the inevitable wave of triad 49ers, but we'll be badly outmatched. Like, *badly.* The odds of survival won't look good for either of us. If Egret weren't pinned down in the loading dock, she could probably get the vault door open. But in order to get to her, I'll have to leave Tsui alone in the vault. If Xiuyan's reinforcements find Tsui before I get back with Egret, well...[She uses her thumb to draw a line across her neck.] So that's the scenario, Seattle. Not a lot to work with, I know. Now tell me. What should I do?If the fighting odds are that bad, going for help sounds like the plan with higher odds of success. Plus it being the version where we don't get killed and also get to hang on to the loot doesn't hurt, not us anyway. Take the gamble and go for Egret. It's the plan with the best chance of success. Could've done that, I guess. It might've worked. Of course, it could've gotten Tsui gunned down in a vault, too. But in retrospect, that wouldn't have been a huge loss. Anyway, that wasn't what I did. I saw what I thought could be a way to save the day, so I went ahead and took it. It was almost like Tsui had been waiting for me to pass him the thing. He seemed eager to take it. He hugged that chunk of rock to his chest like a newborn baby. Colors swam in the stone, and something changed in his eyes. Then Old Man Xiuyan's 49ers breached the door, and Tsui unleashed hell. What went down in that room... well, I've only seen that kind of carnage a couple of times in my life, and I've been running the shadows for years. Those triad men were torn to scraps by the end of it. Don't think I'll ever forget the sounds that they made.[She clears her throat.] I, uh, spent most of the fight huddled up in the corner for my own safety. What Tsui let loose from the stone didn't seem terribly interested in discriminating between friend and foe.So instead of the option that guarantees at least our survival and completion of the objective, the route of choice here was the Hail Mary that could've just as well trapped everyone in some hell dimension for all eternity and which she survived largely by luck? Sometimes you gotta go for the wild card choice of course, but it makes you wonder what the lesson here is going be exactly... So did he summon hostile spirits, or something? Something like that. Truth be told, I don't know what they were... like I said, I was hiding. But he couldn't have done it without the Shiny Object, not in a million years. Whatever they were, the rock brought them here. So what happened then?[She shrugs.] We waited for things to calm down in the vault, and for the things to go slithering away. I think that Tsui had some limited control over them, which is why they didn't eat us. After they were gone, Tsui gave me the Shiny Object back, I put it in my satchel, and we bailed. We collected the others on the way out. They were blissfully ignorant of what'd happened on the other side of the warehouse, and I didn't see a reason to change that. We hightailed it back to the docks and caught the first boat back to the Sinking Ship. Mission accomplished.[Gobbet looks away again. Stares off into space.] From what I'm told, people still avoid Xiuyan's warehouse like the plague. It's supposed to be haunted, even to this day... people who set foot in the building keep turning up dead. Pretty sure I'm one of the only living people who knows why.[Abruptly, her body language changes.] Anyway. That's it, lesson's over. If you've got any questions, go ahead. Gobbet... was there a point to this story? I'm trying to find a moral here. There was when I started telling it. I'd thought I was gonna tell you to be comfortable with breaking the rules. I don't think I'm gonna say that now, though. I'm not feeling it anymore. Why not? At least your team made it out of this run alive. They didn't stay that way for long. But let's leave that for next time, huh? I don't want to get into it just now.Right... let's go back to that earlier question then, assuming that one's still on the table. Can you tell me more about the Sinking Ship in that case? Yeah, sure. The story's over, so we can get into it. Is it typical for groups of Rat shamans to congregate like that? Not terribly, no. I mean, we have lodges, same as any other group of shamans... you can usually find a few of us hanging out in those. I guess that there was just something special about our little group. Or maybe about the Sinking Ship. We liked it... we felt at home there. ...Didn't hurt that the Sinking Ship was well-stocked and provisioned when we, ah... "found" it, either. And don't look at me like that. It was abandoned when we took it. Abandoned? There was a team of shadowrunners that had lived on the thing before us, but they bit it on a job. Cad and Mal heard the knock of opportunity, and they claimed the raft for Rat in record time. Taking over the Sinking Ship wasn't an easy job, mind you... the previous owners had installed traps and automated defenses all over the raft. Cad had his hands full with those for a month. Sounds really cozy, Gobbet. Like a floating deathtrap. That actually isn't too far off. There were explosives, pop turrets, all of that good stuff. Cad and his sister Yasmin took care of most of it without too much trouble, though. Still might just trade it for our current sleeping circumstances, but sure doesn't sound like the optimal arrangement either. Yeah, I can't blame you there.[She shrugs.] Hey, like I said, it was free. There weren't really even any rules to follow, which suited me fine. Malvina was sort of the leader of our little nest, but we never really listened to her. She was always trying to play the mom card, instill a sense of responsibility into us. It was cute. She did have a propensity for getting things done, though. I have to give her that. Anyway, after a few months other people started showing up - squatters, homeless people, shadowrunners, and assorted crazies. As long as they stayed cool with us, we were cool to them. Eventually, it became a community. Imagine that. Stranger things have happened. Think you wound up squatting on the Big Texas because of your time on the Sinking Ship? I dunno. Maybe. Never really thought about it before, but... yeah, maybe.[A corner of her mouth curls upward.] I guess that I'm a water rat now.So long as you don't end up a drowned one. At least not as long as we share the same boat. Alright, let's take a break and come back to this another time. Yeah. Hey, Seattle... I'm sorry that this lesson wound up getting a little unfocused at the end. I'm not really sure what came over me. It's cool, don't worry about it. Well, I still feel bad about it. So look, I'll make you a deal... your next lesson will *definitely* be on point, and I'll tell you what it's about up front. No more question-and-answer sessions. How does that sound? Fine by me, Gobbet. Catch you next time.[She waves.] Next time. Next time! We'll head down to catch up with our local duo of basement dwellers.  Duncan and Is0bel aren't talkative today and we didn't bring Racter to the museum run, so here's what each of their comments would be on it:  Oh man, you remember that megatrid movie we snuck into that one time? The one where the mummy took over Chicago? "Tarim Reborn." Yeah, that was an old favorite. I seem to remember that you kept your eyes shut through most of it.[He nods.] That's the one. Completely freaked me out, I slept with the dumpster lid shut for a week. What a pleasure it was to go on a run that brought back such hideous memories. At least we got that blade out of it. Do me a favor and keep it away from me, though. I'm being serious about that.Alternatively, had we taken the mummy's deal to smuggle it out of the museum instead of punching it to mummy dust: I still can't believe that you made a deal with that thing. I mean, it was a *mummy,* Shin. You don't make deals with mummies![He cradles his head in his hands.] gently caress, I can't even believe I just *said* that. I didn't know that shadowrunners dealt with crap like this. Can't say I'm a fan, Shin. Not even a little bit.---  I always liked the old stories about robbing the rich. I dreamed of being like that when I grew up. You know - a righteous bandit like the ones in "Water Margin," or Sun Wukong. So I liked Wang's angle on the job. Break in, liberate some priceless artifacts, and get out. I can't think of any stories that involved angry mummies, though. That's a new one on me. I figure anything that's been trapped for centuries is probably going to be pissed off. I get it. But I also think it's probably going to be a little crazy in the head. I mean, wouldn't you be? I'm glad you didn't let it go free. I'm not in the habit of trusting ancient, vengeful dead things. That seems like a road straight to trouble.Or if we'd taken the mummy's deal: I mean, I guess I can understand being pissed off if you've been trapped for centuries. That makes sense. But I'm not sure the deal you made with that mummy was a good one. What happens when it's free? Is it going to run around haunting people across Hong Kong? I just hope it stays the hell away from us.---  An interesting diversion. The... ah... "mummies" that we encountered were fascinating. Dead flesh, reanimated by the controlling will of an astral being bound within. Of course, the notion that these creatures are genuine reincarnations of long-dead humans is ludicrous. There is nothing innately magical about human consciousness; the "soul" is an antiquated concept rooted in wishful thinking. A pity that our time with the creatures is at an end. But the job is done, and we have received our pay. And the blade that you recovered should prove quite useful.[He shrugs.] A fine day's work, all things considered.Or if the deal was taken: Thankfully, your deal has earned us the means to summon one of these entities. I should like to study it... dissection would be best, but given the circumstances, I suppose that external observation will do. Good work, all the same. My notes will be the richer for it.
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Dec 21, 2022 22:01
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Kanfy posted:Or if the deal was taken: Ah, Racter. Even when he only gets three lines in the extras section, he steals the show.
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Dec 21, 2022 22:31
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Duncan is right. You don't make deals with mummies. Nobody who made deals with Imhotep in those movies ever ended up winning out. "Imhotep! Save me!" "Why?"
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Dec 22, 2022 03:06
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"gently caress it, let's see if this shiny object actually does anything" is certainly one way to improvise an escape plan I guess. Worked out so you can't complain too hard, but I'd assume the odds were way more on the side of it being something that's either not helpful and/or actively screws you.
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Dec 22, 2022 03:32
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See, that sort of thing is why you should just take grenades everywhere.
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Dec 22, 2022 04:43
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Glad to see this back.
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Dec 22, 2022 07:06
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I love every single character in this game.
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Dec 22, 2022 07:25
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MagusofStars posted:"gently caress it, let's see if this shiny object actually does anything" is certainly one way to improvise an escape plan I guess. Worked out so you can't complain too hard, but I'd assume the odds were way more on the side of it being something that's either not helpful and/or actively screws you. You're a shaman, this thing is probably some sort of shamanist fetish, what's the worst that can happen? (The answer: remember our friend Harrow from the Dragonfall LP? *That* totem spirit would be right at home trapped some fetish buried in a Big Trouble In Little China wizard's warehouse.)
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Dec 22, 2022 10:59
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Also Gobbet is clearly a running disaster.
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Dec 22, 2022 13:36
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Poil posted:Also Gobbet is clearly a running disaster. When you keep experiencing Total Team Kills every ten minutes, the problem might be you. (jk love you Gobbet)
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Dec 22, 2022 13:56
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paragon1 posted:See, that sort of thing is why you should just take grenades everywhere. Grenades can be shiny.
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Dec 22, 2022 13:58
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Fighting Trousers posted:When you keep experiencing Total Team Kills every ten minutes, the problem might be you.
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Dec 22, 2022 14:09
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How long before the inevitable "rats fleeing from a sinking ship" joke?
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Dec 22, 2022 15:31
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Fighting Trousers posted:When you keep experiencing Total Team Kills every ten minutes, the problem might be you.
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Dec 23, 2022 01:36
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By popular demand posted:I love every single character in this game. Yeah, the Hong Kong crew is great all around. As much as I loved the Dragonfall crew, I loved Hong Kong's more.
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Dec 23, 2022 05:38
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