"Official" Spycraft Day Debriefings

[Trigger]

I had a wonderful “Official” Spycraft Day and ran two Day Of The Bullet missions on the weekend.  I think this was a great opportunity for me to teach some newcomers to the way of Spycraft and to challenge some of our seasoned players with the tricky dealings of “The Triggerman”

March 21, 2PM - 6PM, 1st session

I introduced Spycraft to a couple new gamers that have played other RPG systems but never a modern genre.  They all picked one of the eight Iconic Agents that we made up including ID Badge, ID Report, Ammo Sheet and Character Sheet.  I think they liked that they could actually see whom they were playing and get a feel for the character with the Agent ID Report.  A Soldier, Pointman, and Intruder were selected to tackle “The Triggerman”.  I spent a little time going over some of the character sheet and what Action Dice were and after a while we went right into listening to the Audio Mission Briefing and going through the Mission Reports that I printed out.  The team was off to Zurich, Switzerland and rendezvoused with their contact for some vital information.  They decided to check out the target location and tactically deduced the possibly angles “The Triggerman” may use to take out the target.  They then decided to try and take out two of the Swiss Police officers by the main Police station with some knockout poison mixed in with some coffee.  Well, some bad rolls were rolled and the police were asking to see some ID and for the Agents to come with them back to the station.  A brilliant session of Role-Playing ensued as the Pointman, using his Cover Identity, came up with a story of him being a Secret Service Agent who was investigating some stolen printing plates that were believed to have been delivered to the Swiss National Museum, which was the target location.  A long story short, he rolled a Critical Success on his bluff check and any attempt at looking into the Cover Identity was doomed, so they made it inside the target location easily.  I used the 2nd scenario for “The Triggerman” who was disguised as a Swiss Police Officer who yelled out “SHOOTER” as the crowd ducked, giving him a clear shot to his target.  A miserable shot went wide and the rest of the team took him down, but not after shooting “The Triggerman” who was still disguised as a Swiss Police Officer which provoked the rest of security to begin attacking the Agents until the mask of “The Triggerman” was revealed.  A very good balance of Role-Playing, skill checks, Gear use and Combat to start the day off.



March 21, 8PM -2AM, 2nd session

Jumped back into the GC seat with our regular Spycraft gaming group.  This time we had five Agents, 1 Soldier, 1 Snoop, 1 Scout, and 2 Pointmen.  Intel went rather smoothly and the mission was underway once again.  The Agents rendezvoused with their contact and gathered the mission information of the target and target location.  They proceeded to stake out the target location where they learned “The Triggerman’s” possible avenues of destruction.  A nighttime reconnaissance attempt was started only to face overwhelming forces of Swiss Police patrolling the area.  Day two came and the team managed to gain entrance into the secured location via posing as one of the event medical workers.  Another Agent used his Cover Identity and posed as one of the SFBA employees who traveled with his bodyguard who managed to wiggle his way up tot the front of the stage.  I used a massive amount of Action Dice to try and research the Cover Identity, but with having to make 4 challenges and a DC=30 each, proved too much.  The remaining Agents gained access to the one of the higher 3rd floor gift shops and posed as Museum employees to evacuate any patrons so they could get a bead on the whole grounds with a sniper rifle.  Since these were the more seasoned players, I used a combination of “The Triggerman” scenarios.  I had a Jammer go off that caused the PA system to go out where a stage person went to gather a new microphone.  This was just a diversion as the Agents focused in on the spare microphone as a possible EMP or bomb of some sort.  “The Triggerman” was actually disguised as a Swiss Police Officer again and did the “SHOOTER” yell out and taking a shot at the target.  A long story short, all hell broke loose.  The medical Agent Bullrushed the target off the stage and to safety, while the Agent posing as the SFBA and his bodyguard were pointed out by “The Triggerman” as the actual shooters where the rest of the Swiss Police Officers surrounded them.  The Sniper Agents started to take shots at “The Triggerman” who began to flee the scene.  Some well needed Search/Perception checks and “The Triggerman’s” disguise was seen through, who was later captured by the Swiss Police and released to the Agents where he was brought back to the Agency only to die on the way from some unknown ailment.  An Autopsy and Toxicology report were done to reveal “The Triggerman’s” secrets to the Agents. 




I have to say this was a success in my book all around.  Playing with new players and professional Agents made it a great weekend of Spycraft.
 

[Crafty_Pat]

I have to say this was a success in my book all around.  Playing with new players and professional Agents made it a great weekend of Spycraft.

That's awesome to hear! Hopefully we'll see this grow in years to come.

[Trigger]

Hey Gentry.

How did your 2 Spycraft sessions go at the con?  Can you give us some details on what mission you ran and if it was the DotB, what Scenario you used for "The Triggerman" or how the missions went?

Did anyone else run something over that weekend?

[klofft]

I wasn't at a con of any kind, but I did finally begin my World on Fire campaign on that weekend!

[Gentry]

I ran two slots of Spycraft, featuring a collaborated homebrew one-shot involving sneaking onto a yacht and killing a terrorist.  So ironically I ran "Day of the Bullet" missions in which no shots were fired. 

I did this partly because Spycraft is "heard of" in my area, but nobody's played.  So I wanted to keep it simple and keep it very Mission Impossible TV show rather than Mission Impossible Movie.  I therefore opted for something combat-light, to provide a game that would be markedly different from things this area's seen at cons past.

That said, both my tables had great fun.  They got to do some *unarmed* combat, in the form of grappling a guy to hold him down and silence him long enough for the poison's onset time to kick in.  I will forever cherish these words, from a hardcore Camarilla guy who ended up at my table while waiting for the LARP to start: 

"I'm not one for level-based systems, but this was actually entertaining."

High praise indeed. 

As an aside, I used Psions pregens (Dish, Serendipity, Stimpy, Dutchboy, and Overdrive got used over the course of two slots), and I absolutely commend Psion for creating solid iconics that are easy to understand, easy to play, and rounded enough to be useful outside a primary M.O. 

[Trigger]

Since getting the next DotB mission done, I am going to try and run a couple missions of it on the "Official" Spycraft Day of March 20th 2010.  I was going to wait until March to put up for download on TheAgencyStar, but if anyone wanted a copy before that to use in GC preperations purposes, let me know.

[Gentry]

I'd love to take a look, since I'm in process of firming up my game schedule for StillCon in March. By all means hit me with a copy of your mission.

[Psion]

I know this post is old, but I missed this...

As an aside, I used Psions pregens (Dish, Serendipity, Stimpy, Dutchboy, and Overdrive got used over the course of two slots), and I absolutely commend Psion for creating solid iconics that are easy to understand, easy to play, and rounded enough to be useful outside a primary M.O. 

Thanks!

I have so many versions of those since I started using them, I don't know what's in the wilderness; which ones (i.e. what level) did you use?

They started out at 4th level pregens (in a game with Alex and Scott!), though I targeted some characters at expert classes as written. Later versions were 8th, 9th, and 7th level. (I'm guessing it was an early version, since SERENDIPITY has been renamed ROULETTE in my later versions.)

STIMPY (straight up snoop with uber sleight-of-hand and streetwise) is the one I usually see passed over; good to hear he got some play. OTOH, DISH (hacker/inventor boxer) seems to be the one that draws repeat play as a favorite character of some players from year-to-year.

[Trigger]

I'd love to take a look, since I'm in process of firming up my game schedule for StillCon in March. By all means hit me with a copy of your mission.

I sent it to your email listed here at Crafty.

[Trigger]

I had a wonderful “Official” Spycraft Day and ran one Day Of The Bullet missions on the weekend.  I think this was a great opportunity for me to teach some newcomers to the way of Spycraft with the tricky dealings of “The Triggerman”

March 20, 2PM - 6PM

The Agents started out with the usual Intel of having to stop the "Triggerman" from assassinating this year’s victim who happened to be a political activist and actor starring in a theatrical production in London England.  The Agents staked out the area and determined three possible angles the “Triggerman” could use and waited for him to show himself.  It all happened so fast at the end when Agents just missed noticing the “Triggerman” and he actually succeeded in eliminating his target and escaping the scene.  You can’t win them all and I think this will be a lesson in not to ever underestimate the “Triggerman”.

Had a lot of fun running this mission with some new players to Spycraft 2.0.  I specifically wrote this mission to be a little shorter than last years, which we finished in about 2-3 hours.  The new players to a modern RPG finally got into the swing of things as they were trying to blend into their environment and stay out of sight as they hid in the shadows of the Opera House.  I threw in a couple red hearings, which took some of the Agents out of the plan of ever catching the “Triggerman”, and was good to see them take the bait.  All in all, a very good day to play Spycraft.