Unintended Consequences - Cyberpunk 2020

Show notes, Night City Secrets Episode 7

Game Session 5, Part 2 – Unintended Consequences

Cover Art for the podcast from “Cyberpunk madness,” by the artist Eddie Del Rio.  

<https://www.artstation.com/artwork/yW0R3>

Intro and closing music is from Amoebacrew, called simply "Cyberpunk royalty free music.”  It is available on Youtube:

<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ju8z7Ecp1iY>

Background ambient music is from RoyaltyFreeSounds, called “Soundscape Ambient, Cyberpunk Music. Royalty Free.”

It is on Youtube:

<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NVVz6FUxbBc&list=RDJu8z7Ecp1iY&index=2>

DRAMATIS PERSONAE

REF = The Referee

Antigone = Corporate.  Director of Public Relations for the Paupau Collective (PPC in Night City.  PPC is a family autonomous corporation floating out on ships in the Pacific Ocean.  Half-Greek half-Polynesian.

Arianna Papadopoulos-Paupau = (NPC) Corporate.  Antigone’s older sister, the Executive VP of Marketing for the PPC.  They have a good relationship.

“Chewie”= (NPC) Medtech.  Officially, Consuela Jarillo, a Costa Rican doctor currently dating Han.  She is played by the REF. She’s also a pilot.

Eric Genter = (NPC) Corporate.  Senior Director for Petrochem in Night City.  He absolutely hates Antigone for losing face to her a few years ago.  Antigone simply ignores him, but he has it out for her badly. Apparently, he’s now running Petrochem’s Black Ops team.

Hako = Fixer.  Aohako is also Hawaiian, but not related to Han or Antigone. He grew up in Night City and has connections all over the city.  He and Antigone met through their common mentor, Derek Trammel, a former Night City Police Department detective, now a private investigator.

Han = Solo. Full name is “Hanakahi Lonoehu.”  The team Solo and pilot, bioscultped to look like Harrison Ford, though he also has spiky short hair. Native Hawaiian, half-Polynesian, cousin to Antigone.

“Kat” Katrina = (NPC) A Solo merc-for-hire contracted by Eric Genter to kidnap Antigone and take her to a Petrochem warehouse.

Marcella Lemieux = (NPC) A cop working on the Night City Police Department.  She has known Hako for many years and actively is concerned for his safety, so she is willing to help him out.

Mikael Papadopoulos-Paupau = (NPC)  Medtech. Antigone’s younger brother, the Director of Research and Development for the PPC.  He admires his older sister.

Rico = (NPC) A second Solo merc-for-hire who is working with Kat to abduct ‘Tig.

Stahl = (NPC) A pilot for hire, short but very capable Japanese Solo and former fighter pilot.  Used to do odd jobs with Han. Frequently hired by Petrochem.

Surány = Netrunner.  A young and nerdy Czech fame-seeker. Raised in Night City, and went to high school with Chewie. Attained some fame for his “March of the Ents” program: he names all his programs after people, places, and events in the Tolkien Mythos, and has been trying to grow a Gandalf beard.

Tatiana = (NPC) A former employee of Han, a dangerous Solo currently working for the Willow Sisterhood - a Poser Gang who bioscult themselves to look like famous women from media and pop culture who played the roles of bad-asses. Tatiana is currently sporting the look of Scarlet Johansen from the Ghost in the Shell movie adaptation.  Tried to kill Han once when he tried to come onto her.

 

TOC and Timestamps:

** Introduction  @00:26

** Play begins:  @ 1:38

The team establishes a rendezvous with Arianna to remove Kat and Rico from Night City.

** Everyone shows up on the rooftop of the Night City Hilton:  @6:35

** Mikael reveals what they learned from the “Black Box” heisted from Petrochem:  @10:59

** The team tries to find a Bolthole to lay low and recover:  @17:15

** Chewie pleas for the team to re-group:  @33:05

** Antigone shares the screamsheet with the team: @34:20

** Here’s where the primary schism occurs between the REF and myself:  @38:12

** We decide to just roll with it, despite our misunderstandings:  @44:12

** Closing of Session:  @49:30

** Closing Comments:  @49:40

INTRODUCTION TEXT:

Welcome back to Night City Secrets.

The podcast of five gaming friends playing the tabletop RPG Cyberpunk 2020.  

This is episode 7, part two of three of our fifth gaming session.

When last we left, our team had been thrown into a spiral of confusion.  Antigone was kidnapped and somehow managed to escape. Han, Hako, and Chewie almost died in the AV explosion, but managed to rally with Surany and get to where Antigone had been abducted.  

Up until this point, Antigone had been convinced that the actions against her and her team had been entirely driven by the personal hatred of one Eric Genter, a Senior Director at Petrochem, one of PPC’s chief rivals.  

But she slowly came to the realization that this was much deeper — she had implicated her team, her company, and her family into a potentially deadly conflict with one of the world’s largest corporations.  

One that could have deadly repercussions not only on herself and her team, but on her entire corporation and her family lineage.

Let us delve into the murk and the intrigue.

CLOSING NOTES:

If you listened to the bonus episode where I interview the REFEREE, you’ll be aware that we created something we call the “Extended Rolls Tasks” system.  This was basically a way for the REF to figure out how to include interesting content in the downtime between our gaming sessions so that our characters remained active in game.  It is something like the passive AFK skill training in EVE Online or in Black Desert Online or in the yet-to-be-released Crowfall MMORPG.  

Basically, we assign tasks for our characters to complete, we make rolls, the REF makes rolls, we figure out the outcomes when we next meet.

Since I’m the Corporate and I’m funding the operations, I ended up putting in the most time on these tasks.  And there was some disagreement between the intent of those activities between the REFEREE and myself.  

My notes about the intent of these activities was glossed over and the REFEREE took the primary outcome goal to be our activity.  

So while I did not intend to roll into Night City dropping bombs, blowing up refineries, and sticking bananas into the tailpipes of Petrochem delivery vehicles, that’s apparently pretty close to what we actually did.

And we were quite successful at it.

So by the end of this episode, I have fully realized that I’ve now drawn the unwelcome attention of the entire Petrochem megacorp omnibus onto us.  And they have deployed their most lethal and deadly operations teams to take us out. 

Oh happy day.  Tune in next time to see how we try to wriggle out of this one.  

Antigone is pretty sure her own family has a hit out on her at this point…