Game summary for March 29, 2011; present characters included Bernsen (dwarf combat mage), Network (dwarf drone rigger), Tango (ork tank), and Vessel (troll brawler).
The MACHETE black ops team went on a quick shoot-and-loot mission into enemy Amazonia territory on behalf of Aztechnology. The team inserted into the jungle via a watercourse using Network’s chameleon coated GMC Beachcraft patrol hovercraft. Network stayed in the cloaked “safety” of her onboard rigger cocoon but jumped-in to a GM-Nissan Doberman crawler drone. The team moved into the jungle seeking a small group of Amazonia guerrillas. Network had programmed a MCT Fly-Spy drone to scout several meters ahead scanning for movement. Eventually, the discovered a trio of guerrillas approaching. Vessel moved beside a tree, dropped down, and began setting up the tripod for his Stoner-Ares M202 medium machine gun. Network advanced her Doberman drone while Bernsen used a sustaining focus to hang Increase Reflexes on himself. Tango stood in the relative open and tried to lob a mini-grenade from his launcher in the middle of the approaching troops. Unfortunately, the ordnance was caught in some branches and detonated short of the target, blowing down a tree and clearing some line of sight. The three guerrillas advanced quickly, firing short bursts from their AK-97s as they came. They focused fire on the troll setting up the machine gun! A quick firefight ensued, and Bernsen cast a force 5 Fireball amongst the rebels. One burned to death and another suffered grievous injury. Before he could retreat, gunfire cut him and his other ally down.
The MACHETE team advanced further into the jungle and found the remaining five guerrillas, one of whom was an ork lieutenant. Vessel pulled his tonfa and charged one of the orks. Network began a steady stream of short bursts, and Tango opened up with his grenade launcher. This time, he drew a bead on one of the approaching orks and shot him square with a HE grenade. The blast injured the ork and his ally, but most of the trauma was absorbed by armor and pure ork meanness. The ork yelled “Nice shot!” and fired a return grenade from his AK-98. Unfortunately, after arming, the grenade sprung back from a limb and landed behind the ork and his elf ally. More fragments embedded in the ork’s armor, and he staggered about from the back-to-back blasts.
Bernsen rushed forward into battle with his monofilament sword while Vessel began a beatdown on the ork. Several of the enemy focused burst fire on Tango. Fortunately, his armor held, but he was beginning to weaken beneath the barrage. He managed to maintain some composure and place extremely accurate (and deadly) single shots. Network continued to wear down foes with her drone-mounted AK-97 assault rifle, including killing one of the foes engaging Bernsen. The combat mage took advantage of the space and cast Flamethrower, immolating an enemy and putting him down. Vessel finished his clubbing, and the team mopped up the remaining foes.
Although a success the team learned some valuable information on how they work together. They also got their first measure of the forces aligned against them. Overall the mission proved a good test and helped cement the PCs as a team.
The above summary is for a game session of Shadowrun: 20th Anniversary Edition played by the Phoenix Gaming Club.
In Character Journal Entry
March 29, 2011 Game Session – Character: Vessel
I love me some jungle—the taste in the air, scent of danger, and feeling of the shit about to hit the fan. Our mission began as they all should, with ass-kicking. After some epic recon from Network, we got the drop on a set of three jungle poontangs. These were some ugly weaklings. I was able to setup Little John (my medium machine gun mounted to a tripod), Network had control of a Doberman, Bernsen was playing with fire, and Tango armed his Stalwart. Tango cleared out their cover (or was he trying to hit them?) and gave us some room to work. I opened up the butterfly on the gun, Network started firing burst from the drone, and magic man did his fire thing. The trio didn’t last long, and we suffered absolute minimal damage.
Confidence was high, and we progressed forward. Just for fun several of us changed tactics. I put Little John up and prepared to give my hand-to-hand combat a little training. Bernsen starting eying his monofilament sword, and I could tell he was itching to cut someone down. When you’re a badass it doesn’t matter how you go about giving a beat down, it’s just gonna happen. We hadn’t moved much further when 5 bogeys were spotted up ahead. I immediately went toe-to-toe with an ork and beat his ass with my tonfa. Tango exchanged grenade fire with an ork, whom was shot twice (once from Tango and once from his dumbass self). During this exchange, Tango took bullets to the chest—a whole bunch of them. I knew the dude was tough, but I think we could have gotten a few beers with recycling money from all the lead pumped into his chest. Network kept at the remote murder station and took down some more vile jungle filth while Bernsen played sword and fire games with the remaining enemy. Tango took several more good hits, but managed to keep his shit straight. When the smoke cleared, we were still standing unscathed. I can’t imagine that it’s always going to go like this, but at least we got a chance to work out the kinks without encountering any heavy artillery. Before heading out of the joint, several of us gathered up weapons and ammo of the enemy. We left their bodies in the Jungle to give the big cats something to munch on. We need to get this stuff scanned for tags but didn’t want to waste time doing it out in the open.
We learned quite a bit about our strategy, and now that we have some downtime we’re going to work on upgrading some of Network’s drone gear. I’ve got to find something to up my gun accuracy. All-in-all, a beautiful trip to the jungle. OOH RAH!
In Character Journal Entry
March 29, 2011 Game Session – Character: Network
New Rank, New Team, New mission. Many unknown variables, this should be interesting. This new team, labeled MACHETE (not sure who came up with it, probably a 12 year old ork), comprises of the following:
1st Lieutenant Bernsen, may be his real name. This would make him either idiotic, or brave, don’t know which one yet. He is a Dwarf Combat Mage, I expect forest fires will be in our future.
Sergeant-Major Tango, a very ugly ork. Bravery and stupidity mix into a mush that he calls a brain. He probably came up with the team name. I don’t know if he will get himself killed or not, but it won’t be for lack of trying.
Sergeant Vessel, a troll brawler. Well I say a brawler, but I don’t think I will see him fight hand to hand. This guy carries the biggest guns he can find. There are jokes about compensation to be made, but I’m afraid that only Bernsen would be able to comprehend them. All in all, it’s like to have a someone on the field that looks like that big of a threat, makes the drones look like lesser targets.
Sergeant La Eme, a very colorful troll. To be frank, this guy has to be seriously lacking in the thinking department. He’s dressed like a piñata while we try and sneak around in the jungle. Some nice olive drab should be in his future, unless we need to blend in at a Troll Gay Pride Parade.
And then there’s me, just coming from a promotion to 2nd Lieutenant. I’ve changed my call sign, as I don’t think the others need to know my mission history. I’m going with Network, I kind of like it.
I loaded Betsy (my hovercraft) with nearly everything i could think of. In the jungle, we should be able to use the drones to scout and plan ambushes accordingly. Well that’s how someone smart would do it. Once we landed, I sent off a spy drone and Doberman to do just that, until Tango decided we should just announce ourselves. I have a suppressor on my Doberman, to keep everyone from knowing I’m in a firefight. Tango has a grenade launcher, that he’s not that great at using. So infiltration didn’t win that round, we did at least have enough time for the troll to set up his big gun.
The fight was quick, and true to form our team leader tried to light the jungle on fire. It was, however, a loud fight. We had announced ourselves. Back in the hovercraft, I quickly added up how much money was spent of spy bots and suppressors, this was most certainly a waste of resources.
We got a little farther into the jungle when we happened upon (meaning they came looking for us) more enemy combatants. Guess who decided to use grenade? I’ve never that pleased when the one trick pony sucks at his one trick. Luckily, Tango’s target was equally unskilled at grenades and nearly blew himself up. Is this an ork thing? No clue. Vessel surprised me in this fight, without time to setup his big gun; he had to go a beat some unlucky bastard to death.
Bernsen used more fire. This guy is interesting to me. He seems to be fairly well rounded but he uses powers that actually hurt him. This single-minded view on victory is fairly amazing. If he doesn’t kill himself, he should do well.
On another note, I have no clue at all where Sgt. Hot Pants went. I thought about sending some flying drones to look for him. Then I realized that the state I might find him in could be detrimental to my mental health.
I’m going to need to do some upgrading of the drones to keep up with the brazen head first style of this group.