#21 Inspecting the Troops

Hello again Before the Shadow fans, and welcome back to module three of Shadowrun: Antumbra! I know it's been a long wait - real life has been a little unreal over the last two and a half weeks, but I'm hoping to get a couple more posts out before the end of the year.

In keeping with our little tradition, let's recap everything that's happened:

In the first module, 1nv4d3r, a fool-punching ork shadowrunner, saved the people and holdings of a Seattle nightclub named Antumbra by betraying his employer who planned on magically destroying it.

In the second module, he was hired by the Antumbra financier megacorp (Mitsuhama) to violently "investigate" the Aztechnology corporation in San Francisco, but quickly got diverted into stopping a metahuman terrorist plot.

This plot was led by a troll named Shavarus, who had been hiding among the devotees of Emperor Norton IX, a strange old man who claimed kinship to the original Norton and rulership over California. Norton later became both ally and friend.

Aided by the elves of Tir Tairngire, Shavarus had planned to depopulate the entire city by destroying its water supply. We stopped him but spared his life to ensure that he reversed his plans, so the water would remain unspoiled.

After that victory, our hero got overwhelmed by the publicity and tried his best to escape it. Instead, he ran into Norton. After a brief attack by Tophet, an old enemy from the first module, Norton recruited him to defend against an upcoming invasion by the belligerent northern nation of Tir - powerful elves with the support of a whole megacorporation behind them. Sponsored by another old friend, Kali, we're meant to gather allies and supplies, and sabotage our foe from hiding.

The fate of California rests in our hands. No pressure.

We start out in this unassuming little room.

And here's our 'unofficial Antumbra theme' again.

Let's just swing that door open now --

...disappointing. They really have nothing here.

Somehow having just a troll and a dog makes it worse.

The troll apparently looks like the kind of doofus who smokes cigars indoors. He also appears to be mad about the same things we're mad about, which is a good start.

Assuming that eyeroll was for the mystery contact and not 'the boss', we ask for his license and registration.

Right out of the gate, Tomas is professional and efficient.

Booooo. I want my quirky NPCs.

KALI? You were talking to our favourite skullgirl like that??

In the eternal words of Grandmummy:

I mean, on the one hand he has admirable courage to be talking to the boss of bosses like that but on the other - youdonotdisrespectKaliyoupeasant.

With just one more option, we ask about preparations. Despite knowing the answer.

As I recall, module three has a sort of war gauge as you go along: you recruit people, gather supplies and maybe do sabotage? You can actually end up with too much on one front and too little on another (which usually happens to me, I'll talk about that as we get to it.)

But at the moment we need people and supplies.

So, who's this Selene? Let's go find out.

We open door number two to find... two waiting women.

If you aren't Kali or Hailey, we aren't interested.

Alright, that's a bit harsh. Actually, I've already recognised one of them.

Aw no. You're here too? She does have a point about the armour though,

Amelia's always got her ear to the ground. Let's see what she's been hearing.

...great. This is definitely more info than we had a few minutes ago, but doesn't make me feel any better. Also, Amelia is true to form - shamelessly mercenaric.

...yikes. There's a name or two I could be calling this girl right now.

It's kind of fascinating that Amelia is implying that all of the locals' agonising over Saito was all for nothing in the greater scheme. Elf/dragon alliance OP plz nerf.

And honestly, I think she cares more than she lets on. I don't fully believe in the "pragmatic but ruthless" merchant façade. There's a reason she's stuck around our little band despite all the personal danger.

Anyway, this was actually good insight - into both our situation and Amelia herself. With that out of the way, we ask to see her goods.Said goods are literally identical to the last set from the last module, which leaves us with only one purchase to make.

We sell blue rectangle and buy red. Fist weapons are upgraded. Nice.

Not that good either. But good enough. We leave and approach the other woman, who I can only assume is Selene.

Why would I assume that?

Let's just say I have my reasons.

Lady, you deserve a medal for saying that with a straight face.

And I like her already, though since shadowrunners don't generally get this kind of respect, I think this kind of deference would creep our guy out a little.

...just a little. Let's get an actual opinion out of you, even if it's one we already know.

How do we fix that though?

Did somebody say... quest?

This is the most succinct, polite questgiver we've met. And she has nothing more to tell us. Ah well.

There are two other main missions like this. None of them receives any greater weight than the other, so you're free to do whichever one whenever. Not quite spoiler - each one comes with a new companion. I'm a fan of two of the three companions, so I generally do those two first, but I might mix things up this time.

The back of the garage has been set up as a shooting range and field hospital but no one's shooting - or dying.

Norton's more magical dog is here. On the left is a mysterious ork shaman. Directly in front of us is a familiar face - the bartender? The bartender from Antumbra?

You a hipster, dwarf?

We bought armour, a medkit, the spiked knuckles we just sold, and a soykaf. Soykaf was for a guy who gave us a hundred creds to buy him alcohol. And he thanked us.

...that was a strange night.

I dunno man, as far as weird RPG scenarios go, I've seen far worse.

I'd say Planescape Torment or even the original SNES Shadowrun have this beat. SNES Shadowrun: You wake up in a morgue, run through a city where half the population is shooting at you from windows, go to an alley and barter with the spirit of a ferocious... dog totem.

Yeah I'd say Horatio, with his nonchalant disregard, comes off as less invested than Amelia and her "pragmatic merchant" gig. I think that's part of her brand. This guy - he's aggressively vibing 'just getting by idc'.

He's also going to be our ripperdoc when we finally start implanting cyberware, so sucks to be us. We check out his inventory - he sells gear for deckers and riggers and also medkits and trauma kits.

Yep. Alright, time to go then.

We check out our new shaman ally...

...that is not the tone I was expecting from her. We shamelessly ask for another quest. Er, mission.

S H O C K E D

I sense a 'but' coming.

Not only do we have a new quest but a whole new faction to deal with. The "Native Californians" are a canonical policlub that have precious little to do with the actual Native American Nations - they're human supremacists, pure and simple. But we play down our ire.

A group like that is sure to get in our way eventually.

I like your style, friend.

Will do! Second main mission received. We then ask a very pertinent question.

And she gives an honest answer. The actual gear is stuff for shamans, mages and physical adepts.

Nahhh. We leave the garage and backtrack.

Let's see what's behind the last closed door.

...the second-to-last closed door.

It's Norton, because of course it is.

Honestly I was just looking for the restroom...

Ah yes. Them.

We'll take anyone at this point so sure, why not? We ask his opinion on the camp. Given his penchant for reckless optimism, I'm assuming his reply will have to be entertaining. It's probably in his contract.

That is both more and less grounded than I was expecting. We bid him farewell.

This is our final room.

It's bare except for a pair of sleek-looking consoles. One of these must be our link to the outside world.

And it is, literally. Not only can we call Kali here but this is the interface by which we launch our first mission.

But I mean, calling Kali, no way we're gonna pass that up.

Miss you too, rainbow goddess.

Jokey flirts aside, the stakes are pretty damn high. But then we're presented with the menu to beat all menus.

One menu to rule them all

...jeez, girl.

My Shadowrun street lingo isn't perfect but if I'm right, 'wavy' isn't something a producer would usually say in a "professional" capacity. It's more subjective than that. Kali's legitimately impressed on a personal level.

She also has a point though, we need to get things moving again.

It feels a little corny asking for funding right after taking a royalty payment.

So... many.. megas.

Immediately after getting a new mission, we ask about more missions. I sense a pattern here. (Though meeting a bunch of megacorp fogeys on good terms is definitely new.)

cirion's tried here to ensure that players shouldn't just come straight to the console and run off to a mission without finding out that there are other missions around the base. Because if you pick right instead of left in the beginning, it's quite possible

Also how is our widdle Hailey-bean?

Important... important question. Should have been the first question really.

She's all grown up. We're so proud. Also, she's in San Francisco and so are the megacorp guys. If you're thinking that we get to meet her in that particular run - no credits for you.

Next, we ask about orkbro. He might scare us a bit but he's still our bro.

AS YOU MIGHT EXPECT

She's so diplomatic. I don't know why we're asking about Dalmin but we are. Probably to ensure he stays away.

Agreed. There's a strange finality about him leaving the state but he didn't seem as invested in California anyway.

And Kali just confirmed that thing we suspected about Hailey. Nice.

This also means we're out of options. We say our 'so long' and then log into the terminal again.

NOTHING

So here are our options in order:

1. Go to San Francisco, talk to the megacorp guys and recruit Hailey. The game has nudged us into doing this first. She's the only member of the old team still around

2. Selene's mission - meet Rick on Interstate 5, and stop the waterjackers and other gangs from interrupting our supplies.

3. Investigate the Native Californians at Shasta Dam. They might not be a threat now but when our revolution (which will probably be a mixed, ragtag band of metas) gets off the ground, they could easily compromise us.

Plus, we need no excuse to lay the smack down on racists.

4. Go recruit Norton's Army in Colma. We need warm bodies, and we have Norton to motivate them. They'd be sort of trained and sort of supplied, but entirely loyal.

This is the actual order I normally do these missions in. But I think I'll shake it up this time and start with Selene's request - Interstate 5. First come, first served.

We make our choice on the console.

We can only pick two teammates, so it's fool-puncher, Norton, and the fire-breathing hellhound.

..wait, what?

We'll... follow up next time.