Liquidation (forum-based campaign in need of players)

[Dani Potenza]

Okay, so, I really want to run a forum-based Corporation game titled Liquidation via forum, in the traditional, slower, play-by-post style ala Amanita rather than the Oracle sessions-and-downtime model. I’m after up to 6 players who can post on a fairly regular basis, but that’s as in “at least a couple times a week, ideally more, especially when combat happens” rather than “please stay up to 2am every night posting”. If anyone interested could post to say so, I'd really appreciate it and then we can work out character concepts once we know who's in the game. If it's possible for Matt to make a subforum for this and give me mod control over it then that'd be nice, otherwise I'll make a new forum for it.

If you have any questions about anything – I expect probably character concept stuff but anything really - ask me via Facebook message, or in #oracle, or via Skype or Twitter or Tumblr or just post in the thread or I could start a Discord channel for this game if people want?

The premise of the game in short: You are agents selected from various corporations by the UIG to join an elite division with a cool space base tasked to stop a Rogue Archon bent on subjugating humanity. At first, anyway, things will go kind of geopolitically pear-shaped from there and you’ll have to find a way to deal with that and stop a new Corporate War breaking out (or don’t?).

In full:
It is the year 2506. Three years ago, an entity claiming to be the Rogue Archon Narcissus made a declaration, transmitted to every WDN-connected device in the world: “Beginning today, the Droid Liberation Army will seek true liberty for our people through the subjugation of humankind.” Since that day, the DLA has been a menace to the corporations and UIG alike, seizing strongholds across the planet and killing many people through their sudden shift into highly-effective guerrilla tactics organised by a near-unmatched intellect.

The corporations, of course, saw this not as a threat but as an opportunity. A truly inhuman enemy, something they can target to show off their military prowess? Great! The increased demand for self-defence products, mood-lifting media, drugs and simple retail therapy? Wonderful! The chance to make a big deal out of how our new robot is way more secure and won’t be any threat to you at all, unlike that competing brand robot you still have around? Ideal! Some might say all this warlike activity hasn’t been good for inter-corporate politics, but it’s fine, we’re all united against this Rogue Archon, nothing could possibly go wrong!

While the corps continued business as usual, the UIG has not been idle in planning their own response to the DLA. While the usual military forces and Malenbrach squads are effective, it was determined from on high that a special taskforce should be assembled of corporate agents who had proven themselves up to task – so many major world events of the post-war era had been swung in one direction or another by a single highly-skilled division that the project’s value was clear.

You are one of the agents selected for this division, contracted by your corporation to work with the UIG for a year whether you like it or not. You stand assembled for the first time at your new base on the UIG orbital station “Black Knight”, ready to be briefed on your first mission together. Your objective – break into a corporate research facility captured by the DLA and destroy the weapon being developed there.

Character Generation

There are two steps to character creation – your character sheet and your character bio. This isn’t really shocking or anything but I wanted to lead into how I’m dividing up all this stuff.

The Character Sheet

Fill in a character sheet here, changing the name of the sheet to include your (the player’s) name so I know who’s who.

Characters for Liquidation are highly talented agents, chosen by the UIG for to form an elite special ops division, which means they start out more capable than normal starting characters. Also having more things to choose gives more variation to start with and play-by-post doesn’t move at rocket pace so I want people to have lots of choice of build to start. Thus, characters are built as such:

Corporation
Characters may be agents of any of the established corporations, major or minor. If you want to work for a corporation that doesn’t have official PC rules, or you want to have held a position that left you with different abilities to a normal agent of your corporation, let me know and we’ll work something out. I’m also allowing limited replicant PCs; they are made differently from agent PCs, see below for details on generating them.

STATS
Characters start with an extra stat point. Enjoy!

Skills
Characters have the same general spread of skills, but 1 higher, i.e. 1x skill at 9, 1x8, 1x7, 3x6, 3x5, 3x4, 3x3, 4x2. Mind telepathy is not allowed.

Trainings
Characters choose 4 trainings at creation. Ai-Jinn characters gain the Guan Yu Use training for free. Any characters who qualify may take the Mission Officer training for free. If you take Mission Officer, you’ll have a randomly-made green division (as in DA) that answer to you, but be careful in using them – the corporation won’t be happy if you waste their human resources, and the UIG won’t be happy if you put your division in a position to learn secrets they shouldn’t know.

Rank
Characters begin at Rank 4, with 70 Rank Points. Ai-Jinn and Comoros characters do not get their corporate rank bonuses.

Licenses
Characters have up to 15 points of licenses, plus the agent standards and any licenses granted by your corporation’s Uniques. If you want more than that to get specific licenses, ask away, I’ll try and keep people even but I don’t want to lock anyone out of concept or build because they can’t afford licenses for critical gear. That said, the Open Over-Risk License is unavailable - if it exists, people don't know.

Equipment
Characters have the following equipment at character creation:

• 10 Medpacks
  
• IV Medpack (IV pack assumed to be refillable)
  
• Exceptional (condition 12) AMS Black Cougar
  
• PDA
  
• UIG-issued Comms Device
  
• Flak Jacket
  
• Reinforced Clothing (default or customised to your taste)
  
• Handcuffs
  
• ID Chip Scanner
  
• ID Badge
  
• Tactical Assault Shield
  
• 1 Covert Shield
  
• 2 Reflexive Shields
  
• 2 Nano-Res Pack (if licensed to carry)
  
• 2 Invisibility Fields
  
• Level 5 Stealth process chip
  
• Advanced Hacking Software (Optional, illegal but your bosses will look the other way if you’re restrained with it)
  
• Agent Standard Cybernetics
  
• Anascan PSE
  
• Anascan GUI
  
• U-View Optical Sharing
  
• Biostatus Monitor
  

Agents start with 6x their corporation’s starting funds.

Contacts
For the first time in any Corporation game I’ve been in, the Contacts system is being used! Sort of.  Each Agent starts play with 50 Contact Points. At any time, you can spend up to 10 points to establish that you have a Contact who can help you out. A Contact’s rating is equal to the number of points spent. Contacts are typically NPCs you met before the game started, but you can convert NPCs into Contacts with GM permission.

Replicant PCs
As an alternative to playing an Agent, you may play a Replicant. I’d prefer not to have more than one of them, but a second may be allowed depending on group size and character concepts.

Replicants are made as here except as follows:
In addition to your 2 starting trainings, you receive 2 extra trainings. These may be from outside the provided list, but you should consider how a replicant in your position would learn these skills.
You receive a Tactical Assault Shield, a Covert Shield, a Reflexive Shield, 2 Invisibility Fields, U-View Optical Sharing, and a Biostatus Monitor in addition to the standard replicant equipment.
Instead of the AMS Black Cougar, you receive either one Condition 14 weapon or two Condition 12 weapons of your choice. You may not choose Over-Risk weapons.

A replicant PC should ideally belong to one of the other PCs; the owning PC will gain bonus licenses as appropriate to own your PC. If this does not suit you, you may instead choose to be owned by:
a) the group’s UIG handler, Camille Lazard, or
b) another UIG Officer.
If you choose one of these options, I’ll discuss what that means with you since you'll have extra agenda stuff going on from that. Otherwise, make sure to talk things out with the other players. Marauders are recommended over Muses, but if you really want to play a social replicant that’s fine – just make sure to spend some of your starting XP on a decent combat skill.

It’s important to note that, given the group’s initial formation to counter the Droid Liberation Army and a Rogue Archon, Replicant PCs will be somewhat distrusted, though as you will have a standard kill-switch installed things should go smoothly as long as you are loyal. Replicant PCs will also have backups of their AI taken at regular intervals, making you restorable from death – and giving the UIG an example to study if you go rogue.

Bio
Once you've written one, post in this linked thread!

First off, there’s the typical descriptive stuff:

Name: Like it says.
Pic: Put one here if you got one. I'd really like it if everyone could have a picture since I'll want to make maps for combat situations and tokens to mark where everyone is each round.
Description: What do you look like?
Profession: How do you describe what you do? I mean, nobody with Profession: Lying & Acting on their sheet is going to introduce themselves as “Agent Smith, Liar & Actor”.

Please also provide the following:

Drive: What pushes you forwards?
Flaw: Nobody’s perfect – what’s your problem?

Drives and Flaws are important for this game because they’re a big part of how I’m handling Conviction – if you do something you think is really playing to your Drive or Flaw, point it out and I’ll be like “yeah sure have a Conviction point” or “eh, not this time, but maybe if went further you did X it’d count?” Feel free to point out things other people did that you think are worth a Conviction point too.

Backstory: Write out whatever amount you want.

Relationship to your Corporation: What do you think of your corp, as an entity and an employer? Did you object to being sent off on UIG work? If you're a replicant, detail your opinion of your owner instead.

Which major corp do you think would break the peace first? Be honest, you have an opinion on this topic.

What would you appreciate having at your new base? The Black Knight’s a highly-specialised base, with all sorts of resources around – what is there that suits your character well? It might be something of skill-based use like a lab or workshop, it might be a luxury like a nice canteen or a swimming pool, it might even just be that there’s a bunch of cute guys (or girls, or anyone else) around to flirt with. There’s definitely something on the base that’s just right for you, conveniently enough, so tell us what that is.

Things to Keep In Mind

• There's no big need to fill specific party roles, but all characters should take at least one combat skill at 5 or higher – the division was assembled to undertake high-pressure missions where combat is expected if not guaranteed.
  
• I'll make sure to give people opportunities to do their thing - if we have a Kalari agent there'll be chances for cool car stunts every mission, if there's a hacker there'll be things to hack, a wing suit specialist will have things to jump off, etc, so feel free to go for highly-specialised or esoteric abilities.
  
• The PCs need to be able to work as a division towards common goals. Drama is great, tensions between PCs is wonderful, but please don’t play a total asshole (towards the rest of the division, at least).
  
• On that note – having your own agendas is good, but don’t plot to betray the party.
  

Other Stuff

The big change I’m making to the setting is replacing the canon Shi Yukiro with the Shi Yukiro Group, described below. There’s still plenty of cyber-ninjas around, but they’re everywhere instead of just being Japanese.

The Shi Yukiro Group

The Shi Yukiro Group is one of the five major corporations, distinguished by its unusual structure. Rather than a powerful central corporation owning a number of smaller, more specialised companies, the Shi Yukiro Group is an association of relatively minor corporations focused on precision and advanced technology. While the Board of Directors is based in Japan and many of the more influential companies with the SY are Japanese – notably Takata, whose CEO Oyanagi Kameko is the current Chair of the Board – their membership is truly international thanks to a mixture of buyouts, companies growing from SY grants, and the promise of better trade deals for SY technical components and systems. Many of these corporations are very small and quite vulnerable, but the influence and economic power of the SY protects them… at cost, of course, and only for as long as they please the Board of Directors.

The only concentrated area of territory controlled by the Shi Yukiro Group is Japan, which was protected during the Corporate Wars much as in official canon, but due to the spread of their component companies they hold heavy influence, if not explicit control, over pockets all across the planet. Rather than the whole “SAMURAI AND NINJAS AND HONOUR” thing, Shi Yukiro corporate culture is heavily influenced by the diverse nature of the many companies composing it, centred on a strong belief that there’s a perfect job for everyone and you should pursue your own dream with everything you have. Then, of course, you’re expected work yourself to the death for the corporation, but hey, if you love your job then you never work a day in your life, right?

While agent protocols across the Shi Yukiro Group vary heavily, there is a common focus on the high-precision weaponry that the Group’s constituents create. A standard Shi Yukiro Group agent uses the Shi Yukiro Unique Abilities and Equipment as presented in the core book (p111), but may switch out the Masterbuilt Katana (condition 14) and Powered Melee Training for an Masterbuilt Laser Pistol, Laser Rifle, or Laser Cannon and the Quick Draw Training.

Alternatively, you might want to play an agent specialised in the tactics of their own company within the group. Only Takata have official stats, but if you want to play an agent of one of the others ask away and we’ll work something out. A player character might alternatively be the head of – or at least a controlling interest in – their own small Shi Yukiro Group company. These characters trade out their Powered Melee Training for Business Developer (EB 9) or Salesman (CoG 38), and get a bonus to be discussed in place of the Masterbuilt Katana, typically a piece of rare or high-condition equipment produced by their company.  This is another one of those “sort it out with the GM” kind of things.
                                                                                                                 
Component corporations of the Shi Yukiro Group include, but are not limited to:

• Air-Lyte
  
• Anascan
  
• Cycom Communications
  
• Datanetica
  
• Hachiman
  
• Knox
  
• Shinjitsu
  
• Shirakawa
  
• Takata
  

Things Which Are Canon

As a baseline, we’re working off the new content and rules published on the Oracle forum (except the Downtime system) plus anything from Everyone Else Friday that’s not already Oracle canon. The following stuff (which is much, but not all, of the Player-Genned Things thread) made by other people is also canon and available here:

Weapons

• Assorted weapons by Mattilda
  
• Fire Shotgun by me
  
• “Tigress” prototype Sword Launcher by James (for each condition level above 10, reduce the penalty by 1 to a minimum of -1)
  
• Arliv Weapons Incorporated by Mattilda
  
• Continuous Laser Rifle by me
  
• Trick Arrows by James
  
• Ball and Chain by Mattilda
  
• AMS PR101 “Stormcrow” Variable Power Plasma Rifle by Rich H
  
• Penumbra “Bleeding Edge” Gloves by Chris B
  
  Cybernetics
  
• Hachiman Tengu Skeleton by Mattilda
  
  Other Gear & Robots
  
• EI Robotic Weapon Selection Assistant by James
  
• Supressadreme by Trina
  
• Y&S Mark III Cyberhorse by Mattilda
  
• The Shinjitsu Wildlife Codex by Chris M
  
• Gun Bear by Chris B
  
  Trainings
  
• Brutal Smash by me
  
• Living on the Edge by me
  
• Advanced Agent: [Skill] by James
  
• Snap Aim by Rich H
  
• Walk On Water by Mattilda
  
• Unyielding Ion, Bullet Block, Charge, and Brutal Assault by Chris B
  

If there's something you've made that's not on the list but you'd like to see used (or use yourself), speak up and I'll look at it, try to bring it in.

Miscellaneous World Details

• Two Snakes Medical is an independent corporation in competition with EI for the medical space, as in the books, rather than an EI subsidiary.
  
• For those who were in it, you may have realised – if I haven’t told you already – that the Replicants game I ran is canon to Liquidation and is in fact the thing that kicked off its plot. If you weren’t in it, all you really need to know is what’s above. I’m not gonna take any deep dives into continuity there, stuff I do draw on will come from the assumption the players  - like the PCs  - aren’t aware of that game’s events.
  
• This is 44 years before the era when Oracle takes place, so there’s no version of the Oracle corporation, AU or otherwise, around.
  

I'm sure there's things I haven't mentioned or thought of - point stuff out, ask away.

[Silvia Tsukuda]

Definitely interested. Being the head of a small SY company sounds very interesting...

[SosieTerrehaute]

I COULD STILL PLAY SOSIE
but I won't. I hope everyone's ready for Lester Fucking Buttercream.

[Fenris]

I would definitely be interested in this game. Less interested in someone fucking buttercream though.

[SosieTerrehaute]

THAT'S HIS LAST NAME
BUTTERCREAM

[Dani Potenza]

So that people know, Mattilda's also said they're down for this and building an SYG thrown weapons specialist.

[Fenris]

I know Trina.

[SosieTerrehaute]

lester buttercream

[Tansai Kay]

I'm in and I'm making a silly character based around called shots, shurikens, and being worryingly obsessed with having a proper challenge.

[Dani Potenza]

A couple of things:

• An extra house-rule: after you throw a weapon, you can draw another weapon in the same action. You have to decide in that moment, and your trainings still determine the number of things you can throw.
  
• If you want to have a special piece of unique or prototype equipment, ask and we'll work something out, including how much of your starting money it'll set you back.
  
• Light-hearted fun characters are great, but you need to be able to take them seriously. I'm aiming for something around Oracle's tone, where OTT things happen and there's levity but also there's consequences and drama. Weird names are fine, there's gonna be NPCs with weird dumb names, and characters with stats built around bizarre combos are good, but don't just play a joke. Not that I expect any of you to do that, but I figured it was worth mentioning since I hadn't really brought up tone at all yet.
  

[Coraline]

I'm so in, you couldn't stop me if you tried.

[Dani Potenza]

A thread to post your bios in now exists.

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