Mission 2b - Special Delivery

WuJen smiles "Or I could go with the illusion of several armed rotodrones like the one Chougou already has in the air swooping in to back us up.  Whatever seems like it might scare them enough to leave us be, should trouble start.  Full Sensory illusions can be pretty startling if you aren't expecting them."

"Of course, if a fight really does break out, they can be introduced to Earth, tonight in the form our new friend Roll.  He will help us out twice, and if that does not get the job done and things get out of hand, I'll call on Fire and see if it's in the mood to play with trouble."

"Intimidation may actually work well. Besides, that looked pretty cool! Can you do that on people too? Can you make me look like Takamura Kenshin in Blades Off The Handle while I fight? With the flame effects following my punches?"

Chougou offers basic control (monitoring and simple movement and such, it should just follow us normally I expect) to the rotodrone to anyone that can take it and asks if maybe Wujen could create a few more of them as a distraction if they get into the thick of it so they won't know which one is shooting at them or which one to shoot at.

Other than that he plods through traffic and checks in on the rotodrone feed whenever they are stopped in traffic. ((is there a check that I can roll to find out what the drone sees?))

WuJen does a quick matrix search for the character to get a decent picture, concentrates for a moment to set up the mental picture for his illusion and says "Pretty much anything I can imagine or get a good picture of is possible, though the transformation isn't real so it works best if you are about the same size as what you are pretending to be"

With that, WuJen transforms into the Trideo character for a moment, and then his features begin to slide into different looks, slowly and subtly melting from one face and form to the next.  Young Sim stars, Old distinguished business men from corporate screamsheets, an oddly grinning Little Dragon though apparently about 12 years old, a humanoid robot, Trolls, Dwarves and on and on, all speaking with WuJen's voice as he demonstrates how the illusion works and why it's problematic if the disguise goes too far away from the actual physical form of the subject.

Sorcery (Physical Mask, Force 3)
WuJen carried out 12 launched of one d6 :

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Drain
WuJen carried out 11 launched of one d6 :

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"Yeah, I can make a whole fleet of them, so long as they are more or less together.  Where ever I put it, the illusion only extends a few meters, so maybe 3 or 4 flying in a tight formation"

"That's good enough. The dryad did the same, back at the farm. It made her surprisingly difficult to hit."

"The druid did something different.  I could probably do something very similar with what I'm doing, but it would take a lot of concentration and it would not work quite the same way.  I watched her from Astral Space and could not have told you which one was actually her, while anyone with astral perception that cared to look would see this illusion spell for what it is.  Actually changing your aura is advanced magic that I frankly don't have the skill to pull off yet, and I'm still not sure if that's what she did or if she knows a specialized spell I've never heard of to do it."

"Short story on that, she was impressive.  Eventually I'll have to go visit and ask her about it, but for right now I prefer to let you smack things while I hide in the van and cast from behind tinted windows..."

((I'll do perception checks for Chougou, the drone and whoever is sitting shotgun when needed. Your characters don't know when something to be noticed is about so I don't want to give you ooc hints by saying hey! Everyone make a perception check!))

The traffic is slowly plodding along, but you rarely get out of the 20-30 kph range despite the speed limit being around 45. You've been going for a good 40 minutes now and are less than a quarter of the way. On the up side, there has been no trouble. Given the traffic, it would be pretty hard for most trouble to get to you anyway.

((gonna be hosting a board game night, so I will be gone for the rest of the night. Feel free to discuss plans in my absence))

"I can do that, as long as you put the fire trails on my punches and kicks." Sun leans over to Chougou again. "Are we there yet?"

As Sun grumbles about the time, you all hear the rumble of motorcycles in the distance. Through the drone, you see several people on motorcycles weaving their way down the lane lines between cars. The motorcycles look like several different unrelated motorcycles were cannibalized for parts and somehow slapped together in a way that works and yet really really shouldn't. The double barrel of some kind of firearm protrudes from the face of each motorcycle. The riders themselves are wearing leather outfits stitched together in patches as if the leather itself was as much scavenged as their motorcycle parts. They are scarred from what looks like countless battles, some of whom are sporting obvious (but outdated) cyberware.

You don't know if these guys are here for you or not, but they are definitely out to cause some trouble.

WuJen looks out the window and says "Oh look, the local Go-Gang has apparently showed up.  Chougou, make sure you record everything.  If this kicks off we want to be sure that the enormous property destruction gets blamed on the appropriate parties."

With that, WuJen slips his perceptions into the astral plane and gives the bikers a Hairy Astral Eye to better get an idea of what they are up to.

HAE roll. (it's just easier than saying Assensing.  I have to look the word up every time to make sure I spell it right.)
WuJen carried out 8 launched of one d6 :

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Percieving, mostly looking for spirits and to see if any of them are magically active or have spells on them.

Wujen opens his mind to the astral plane and finds he is only able to see the inside of the van as the windows and walls are opaque and the video feed from the drone shows nothing but blackness. To get a good look at the motorcyclists, it seems he will have to either roll down a window and poke his head out to see behind the van, or project and leave the interior of the van.

WuJen leaves his body and rises through the van's roof to get a good view.

Peeking up through the roof, he sees about 6 riders making their way between cars. One appears to be awakened. Unfortunately the pollution of all the cars in close proximity seems to be screwing with his ability to assense or something so he can't tell much more than that.

WuJen takes note of the awakened biker and returns to his body.  He highlights the biker in AR so the whole group can see.

"That guy is magically active.  I didn't take too long to really get a good read on him though.  If shooting starts, that's where the first bullets need to land.  This also means that he will be less likely to be fooled by any illusions.  No idea really, he may be an Adept, or he may be a full magician."

Ichigo draws his ares It 75 and checks his ammo making sure his good to go!

Chougou looks for escape routes! Specifically if Wujen could float them over to another platform or even the top of a building where they could mount a more vigorous defense.

Wujen, we are sitting ducks here, if they come up on us we might need you to make this thing fly if you can. I'll get the droids battle ready, we might want to mask the drones too if that's possible so that we can harass the others while you focus on the mage, but you let me know what you have the bandwidth for!

((If there is a portal on the top of the bulldog? If not I would like to install one to deploy drones from so they don't have to go out the door))

Chougou lets out a crawler through whichever way is available and brings the rotodrone back toward home.

"Mount up fellas" he says with a slight rev of the engine as he is still jacked in.

Wujen is pretty sure that he can't lift the van. It would take a fairly large army of mages to manage the amount of lift required to get the van in the air. ((Not including your own weight, a typical armored truck, which is at least how heavy this van is, though likely more, is about 6350 kg. At 1 hit per 200 kg, that would take 32 hits to lift with levitate.))

Chougou is unsure what to do as far as escape routes are concerned. He would basically have to plow through traffic to escape on the van. ((the van does not currently have a portal on top, though a portal or drone rack could certainly be installed in the future.))

Ichigo looks at the back doors for windows.

Out of ideas that he saw on trideos about shadowrunners, Chougou starts thinking about how to defend against the bikers if they prove hostile. He has no good ideas short of flat out murder...the rotodrone rests on top of the van ready to go.

"How could these guys know that it's us that has the package, assuming that they are after the package? Someone must have seen us and relayed the information. I really need to get a second cover van..."

((What would it look like if Chougou were to plow forward into cars honking his horn? Is it possible that they might start getting out of the way, or are they sitting ducks?))

"We might want to deploy outside the van before they get any closer, otherwise the only way to fight them will be by opening the doors." Chougou makes a mental note to install gun ports.

Chougou makes a mental list of every modification he wants for the van but has yet to get around to doing. Traffic is almost bumper to bumper. Plowing through would mean smashing into other cars. They just don't have the room to get out of your way short of driving on the sidewalk. The van is pretty heavily armored, so it may possibly be alright, but the cars it plows through will most certainly not be. Still, if you want to try and escape without a fight, it may be your only option...

WuJen looks at Chougou, "Calm down, it would take a bit of preparation to make a fully loaded van of this size fly, and even at that it would hover along slower than you can get out and walk, plus call attention like nobodies business.  It could be done, but only if you got a while *and* you want to ensure that everyone takes note and has plenty of time to watch or get involved."


(OOC: If I had to do it, I'd do it by lifting several individual things, like the tires, attached to the van at maximum force until the thing got off the ground or I was suffering too many sustaining penalties to try. 6 force 6 spells would do it, though I'd need a whole lot of time to get that lucky, especially after the first couple.  Probably easier to just summon a monster spirit to pick it up, or at least help, since with a force 6 Spirit of Man we could split the load between us and 4 spells each would probably be doable.  Even so, it's still only going at a walking pace and probably make the evening news.)

To Little Dragon he says "Please go get a better look at that guy from astral space, and see if he's a full magician or some kind of adept.  If he sees you, get away from him, there is no need to endanger yourself.  If he threatens  us, we will deal with him together."

"I cannot do for the drones what I can do for a person without significant coordination and practice.  Drones aren't people, and Physical Mask works mostly for people.  I could put the illusion of a big cannon on top of the van, but it would be best if the van was either still or very predictable.  Imagine the cannon and van as two separate toys, I'm trying to hold the cannon on top, and you are swooping the van around the floor.  Unless we practiced a lot, odds are the van and cannot won't look much like they are attached or belong together.  If the van is still, it's pretty easy."

"Now, what I *can* do while we are moving around is plenty.  For one, in addition to your combat drones I have Roll on speed dial.  He's not the biggest piece of Earth around, but he's going to be plenty unless those guys are really packing some heat.  He's immune to most small arms fire that isn't armor piercing, and even then it's going to take a lot of lead to hurt him.  Earth Elementals are hilarious in a fight--- they are very strong and their powers can slow your movement to a crawl or outright stick you to the ground, as well as Roll in particular can  produce the supernatural fear of falling off a cliff."

"Also, if you can point me to a particular weakness of the bikes or their gear, I can use Magic Fingers to just...you know, shut it off, pull it apart, or whatever.  Depends.  Also, while I can't pick up the van easily, I can do a bike.  Also imagine riding on a motorcycle when physical barriers keep appearing right in front of you, about chest high.  I'm betting that's annoying.  Also... the illusion thing?  It only has to make sense if you are trying to trick someone.  Do something simpler, like wrapping them in a pure black ball with an glowing red X at their center of mass?  I'm betting that's not great in a fight."

"Personally, I'd not assume that the gangers are here for our package.  It's not as if they are bearing down on us in particular"

WuJen glances out the window to be sure that is still the case.

"It looks more like they are just out prowling for whatever they can find."

"Don't worry about us getting out of the van and being exposed.  Remember that I can put walls where ever I want.  I can cover us if it turns into one of those kinds of fights.  I'm really hoping that's not whats going to happen here though, because if a fight breaks out right here, then this particular patch of traffic may not move until the cops decide to let everyone go.  At the end of the evening we may wind up wishing we had all just come down here on bikes"

"So unless something kicks off, just stay cool.  We are just another van on the road, inching our way on home.  No need to make us look interesting by deploying around the van or getting excited.  If it looks like they are taking an interest in us, or even to someone in the area, I'll go talk to them."