High-Level Breakdown
Objectives:
Infiltrate Facility
Steal Data
Destroy Facility
Links (opens a new tab)
Let’s Play #1 (Loud Entry)
Let’s Play #2 (Covert Entry)
Let’s Play #3 (Covert Entry, Power Cut)
So, how to make this Jenga tower feel like something players are creating themselves and not something that is just happening to them? Good interactive storytelling makes it personal when the player creates a part of the story.
This quest is extensive, to say the least, and not every detail is covered here. Links to a Walkthrough and Let's Plays are available by following the links above. What’s highlighted is how I took a central concept, a stacking set of decisions, fit it into the world of Shadowrun and then brought it all to life through a large and diverse set of interrelated encounters.
Player Exit
Exterior
As soon as you arrive you are told by your fixer, Paul Amsel, that going loud will start the clock for the High Threat Response Team, heavily armed enemy reinforcements, to arrive. After the first shots are fired, that clock starts. This puts the pressure on you to find a quiet way in and look for every possible edge to achieve a difficult objective.
Combat focused characters will be tested but will likely be successful going loud. For other player builds or other player types a more subtle approach is available.
You can enter the facility in one of two ways. Either by kicking down the heavily guarded Front Doors or entering covertly through the Side Doors. Skill checks can aid you in entering unnoticed by dealing with the utility worker at the Side Door. The skill checks, at least initially, with the utility worker are high, but these are not the only elements available to gain entry.
So, we have a high combat gate, or a high skill gate. Players that are able to pass these gates are welcome to move on. But for those not up to those challenges or who are motivated by exploration there is one more element to aid in gaining entry.
You can choose to put the lives of some young cafe owners (“Cafe Kids”) at risk by cutting power to the facility. If you cut the power, the skill checks along the covert path with the utility worker are lowered. Additionally, non-combat checks inside become easier as well.
The exact nature of the consequences, both positive and negative, of this choice are not initially communicated. You make the choice and then see what happens. Choices are fundamentally more interesting if you are left wondering a bit how the specifics will play out.
However, it is critical that if you choose to cut the power it's communicated where and when things are made easier later. Quest interactivity is great, but often its results need to be well communicated to make the investment in dev time pay off.
Finding this encounter takes exploration and is away from the marked objective, it is possible to bypass it entirely. It depends on context and constraints, but I find value in making content missable or blocked because of player choices. Consequence helps create meaning.
Most players did encounter the Café Kids and whether you chose to cut the power or not, it's a decision that stays in the back of your mind as the quest progresses.
Player Exit
Player Start
“Cafe Kids”
Simplified Flow
Next you find yourself in some seemingly unassuming corporate offices and need to reach the Elevator to get to the lower floor.
You possibly could have entered, guns blazing, through the front entrance and the countdown for the heavy enemy reinforcements is already running.
Or maybe you passed some high skill checks at the side door? Maybe you cut the power and passed some medium skill checks? If you did take the quiet approach, it's time to weigh the risks of being caught vs exploring for an additional edge.
Because there is a lot of variability in this quest, I had to ensure it would be fun and functional no matter what was happening. When there is a lot of interactive potential you need to be comfortable letting the player take the wheel and with players having different experiences given their choices, which is after all is a primary focus of this quest.
It is true in this quest that there is more “content” if you go quiet but what if that’s not what your character is about? What if it's not what you enjoy? In that case, you can have a series of tough dynamic combats and call it good, nothing wrong with that. As a quest designer I don’t think all paths have to get the same amount of effort or one particular way has to be exactly as much fun as the others.
Every quest should be fun for all players but quests, on an individual basis, can choose to go hard in some aspects and less so in others. This mission is an infiltration that could explode into action at any time so that’s where its focus is.
Player Exit
Interior Office
Player Start
Side Doors
Player Start
Front Doors
Patrols
Patrols
Uniforms
Simplified Flow
While there are other interesting diversions and rewards on this floor the primary element is locating uniforms that can aid you in later checks further inside the facility.
If you have made the significant choice of cutting the power, patrols can’t call for help and can be safely eliminated without fear of starting the time for the High Threat Response Team and having the facility become hostile. This greatly reduces the risk of exploring this floor and gaining the uniforms.
I did set it up so that the uniforms are still available if you have gone loud at this point, but they don’t do anything. Besides providing a moment of comedy this communicates to you that there was another path available here, but you are not on it.
Lower Floor
Guards
Guards
Matrix
Simplified Flow
Once on the lower secure floor you face increasingly difficult skill checks to bypass two groups of guards without going loud. Past decisions and actions (cutting power, gaining uniforms) will push the odds in your favor.
Here players are really feeling the Jenga tower of past decisions they built and the tension rises if they are still trying to keep things quiet and avoid the High Threat Response Team.
If they went loud, or were discovered, the clock is ticking, and the High Threat Response Team is getting closer with every turn also increasing the pressure.
The Matrix system just past the main entry to the floor is required to open the door on the critical path to progress. If you did cut the power it also contains a way to erase the Cafe Kids involvement. It does however take some exploring in the Matrix to find and it might not be worth the look if time is tight.
As soon as you open the door to Blood Mages lab the fuse on the final act of the quest is lit. One way or another combat is going to kick off against these unique and powerful enemies.
What’s revealed is that Blood Mages are using clones grown from DNA to cast blood magic via the clone to its donor. It is a dark and twisted project with potentially devastating results should it be successful.
Also in the mix are clones that have been used in experiments that you can optionally save for bonus rewards.
After gaining the critical project data, guarded by the Blood Mages, you can proceed to the generators to destroy the whole facility. Once the code is entered a timer starts and you must escape before time expires.
At this point things are likely boiling over and quite possibly your entire Jenga tower is about to fall over.
It’s possible, even likely at this point that:
You are in a pitched battle with Blood Mages
The High Threat Response team is about to arrive or is already showing up (they arrive in waves to pace out the challenge)
You have rescued the clone test subjects and they are running for their lives
The entire facility is about to explode
This is a high-pressure climax and is something that you yourself had a large role in setting up how it plays out. As a quest designer this was wonderful to see come together in a fun, often chaotic and compelling way.
In order to exit you must use my favorite Matrix jackpoint ever. It is required to unlock the door and escape. It is placed just around the corner from generators so players will often set them to blow before checking if their escape path is clear. This adds an extra, almost over the top, last minute complication hacking against the clock.
It is designed that all you have to do is look at the door marked with an objective marker to know the complication exists. So, it's mostly on you if the facility is already set to explode when it is discovered.
It's a bit heavy -handed and in point of fact I scripted it so the first player character that sees it has a quick word bubble pop up saying, “Another locked door. Wonderful.”. It is a final high-pressure wrinkle that is all in good fun for a big finish.
We were fortunate with Dragonfall at Harebrained to get a second swing at that content with the later Director's Cut release and I was able to add a nice denouement for the crew and the clones (should they have made it out). It was great to have a moment to be like “god damn” and gaze into the smoking crater where a formidable facility hosting a nefarious project once stood.
With the initial release the big escape went right to hub loading screen and the quest was not sticking the landing as well as it eventually did in the Director’s Cut.
Objective Data
Blood Mages
Generators
Player Exit
