Shadowrun, StrikeTeam: Operation Hazzard Heist, Finale

The intrusion went like clockwork. Placido and Garlak waiting in reception, ready to create a distraction that was never needed while Miroslav and Wires used fake keycards to enter from the side.

They had already identified their mark - the site's head of IT - and moved under cover of Miroslav's invisibility spell to his office on the first floor.

Miroslav showed his worth by Fast Talking and casting Manipulation spells: getting him to interrogate the system for them. But when it came to trying to snatch a copy of the data from him things went awry.

Wires discretely drew his Narcojet pistol, but a single dose wasn't enough to knock him out. Thinking quickly Wires threw a rabbit punch that knocked the mark unconscious.

Using Invisibility they were able to sneak the body from the building to delay its discovery. They decided against killing him, instead leaving him tied up in a motel room to be found the next day - by which point they hoped to be long gone.

With their faces known the airport in FDC would be a mistake. Nixing the idea of driving to Seattle they decided a road-trip to Pennsylvania, and an airport there, would take them far enough away...

Shadowrun, StrikeTeam: Operation Hazzard Heist

We join in the middle of a campaign that has been running since the new year. The players are members of a LoneStar special detail designed to pro-actively deal with hardened criminals using the lawlessness of The Barrens to cover their activities and escape the law - i.e. Shadowrunners.

The group currently consists of:

Wires - Human, Skillwire user and team-leader.

Garlak - Ork, Former SWAT marksman.

Placido - Troll, and former Special Response Team grunt.

Miroslav - Human, Corporate Mage and Corporate Intelligence operative.

While visiting a seedy bathhouse in Touristville a British diplomat, and member of the Opposition Party was drugged and kidnapped by three men, who the team suspect to be members of a British special forces or paramilitary group, before ditching their cars in The Barrens.

The group's patron, Mr Johnson from the Corporate Arm of LoneStar, wanted the team to unmask the killers - so he can use the information to blackmail or trade stock with the UK government to secure security contracts - and thus improve his value to Corporate.

To this end he offered the team a 100 thousand nuyen 'gift' were they to take a paid vacation to the Federal District of Columbia and break in to the British Embassy - using their satellite link to access British government databases and search them for the assassins' biometrics taken from the vehicles they abandoned in Seattle.

Plan B was the first to be determined. Narcojet tranquiliser pistols and less-lethal Gel rounds were easy to secure but Neurostun Grenades were unavailable in this unfamiliar city. They also quickly ruled out E-Mags as they were too obvious when used and risked sparking an alarm needlessly.

The team hired a Decker, and native to FDC to hack in to the building's security from its exposed junction with the Local Telecomms Grid and snatch the embassy's security-card database. Using this fabricating any security card ex-recto would be trivial.

The next three days were spent studying the building and its workers. The grounds themselves were warded against magic crossing, yes, but the building itself - if a spell were cast from within the grounds - would appear to offer no resistance. The exterior doors were unguarded, protected only by maglocks - which they already knew they could circumvent. The plan, it seemed, would be simple...

Belphegor's Quest, Prologue

A couple of newbies to tabletop cornered me to GM for a couple of hours on the promise that, were this to become a full campaign, they would secure a third player for future sessions. The characters were premade by me (for expedience) and names have not been settled for the characters yet as it's been of little importance to the story so far...

The occultist human priest and the elven wayfaring mage reached the varangian settlement on the edge of frozen Jotenheim. The cleric was seeking a haugr deep in the tundra and for pay as guide the wizard had promised his good relations with the Jarl and the use of the settlement as a stop-over to replenish supplies and rest for the final leg of their long journey.

All in the village were dead, huddled deep within the meeting hall and watched by the corpses of their militia.

Following the tracks they came across a dark cave. The wizard crept in, slowly, finding goblins within. A plan was hatched to set a fire at the mouth of the cave and bring silent vengeance to the goblins for the sacking of the village.

Looking through the remains of the Goblin's hovel in search of the provisions they desperately needed they found no dead Goblins - they had passed through a fake wall in the cave into a man made passage.

Avoiding the goblin traps they passed through a rotten, abandoned, cellar and up stairs to a wooden door - separating them from the scared Goblin voices they hear waiting within.