Part 2: Grind of Thrones.

So let's talk a bit about the level system. The level system is fairly simple in Shadowrun. each enemy is worth a certain amount of EXP, an invisible stat. 8 EXP = 1 Karma, no matter what, all throughout the game. This'll make sense in a second.



Every time you sleep, you get the option to use karma, let's go ahead and do that now.



So right now our body stat is at 7. In order to level up a stat, you need the same amount of karma as your current level.



So now we have eight! That's all there is to it. Simple but effective. The only real problem is you'll get to points where you have to grind a bit of karma. That's what all those random rooms with jerks in them are for.



By the way, uh, so in preparation for this update, I did a bunch of grinding off screen. Basically while I was watching the Game of Thrones finale, I just absentmindedly kept swinging through mook rooms and slaughtering the goons inside, then running to bed when I got hurt and doing it again. We have Computer and Charisma fully maxed out at 6. Firearms maxes out at a much higher level, but after level seven, there's no benefit since the Beretta never misses at seven, and every other weapon has better accuracy with one exception...

You guys really aren't missing anything by not seeing Jake level up more organically, This just makes my life easier, and your lp more awesome. I also turned off Bilinear filtering on the screenshots. Maybe Jake's shades have corrective lenses

In any case, we've got no memory, we've got a computer in our head we have no idea about, thousands of men are trying to kill us because some douche named Drake wants some package we lost a while back, what would you do in this situation?







Well I don't have a matchbook for this place, but I think it'll do just fine. This place has some pretty great music too. Let's hit up the bartender and see what he's got.



"Wait, you know who I am?"

"Kinda hard to miss the blonde dude who never wears anything but a trenchcoat. One iced tea, comin' right up!"

"That better be slang for something powerful."



Barkeep is off to get us a drink, so let's chat up some of the others.



"Well, I'm pretty sure I was dead for a while, if you call that 'wrong'. That and the hordes of gunmen."

"You'd best be prepared. I've had to heal enough men who thought they were safe running in the shadows."

"If you know someone who could heal a burnt brain, I'd be happy to hear any suggestions."

"Forget all that talk of magic, you're better off leaving yourself in the hands of a skilled street doc."

"Might not be a bad idea, it's not like a check-up could hurt. Maybe a street doc could give me some answers."

"Pity I'm retired, but there are some good ones around. Most can handle tech like that datajack of yours."



Doc's got some good advice, but our drink is ready.

"Wait, this is seriously just an iced tea."

"Sorry Jake, it's a Nintendo game. Best I can do is iced tea and grape juice."

"I bet Joshua doesn't have to deal with this crap."

"So what's been happening with you? Last I heard, some Mr. Johnson had you lined up for a run."

"You'd know better than I do."

"Something wrong? Last time I saw you, you didn't have that datajack. Can't you remember even having it fitted?"

"This thing? No idea. I assumed I always had it. Woke up at the morgue with no memories. Had to find out my name from a threatening voicemail. Fortunately the guy left his name at the end of it too. And that's not even mentioning the hundreds of hitmen I've been fighting off"

"Someone after you? Maybe you should hire some Shadowrunners to watch your back!"

"That's not a bad idea, I'm kinda swimming in cash right now. Where can I find these shadowrunners?"

"There's a few who are regulars. Deckers mostly. Why, you thinking of hiring?"

"I will be. A guy needs friends after all."

"No better friend to have than a shadowrunner when you've got guys like that after you. Good luck out there, Jake."



We still have a couple of folks to talk to. We're apparently a regular at this place, so someone might know us.



"Believe me, chum. I know the feeling."

"Look, I just want to relax and unwind."

Looks like our new friend is giving us a hint that he wants to be left alone. This is, in fact, a puzzle.



I got stuck on this forever. You have to actually give this guy your iced tea. You can't actually drink it yourself.

"Cheers chummer. My favourite too..."

"Null sweat. Actually I had a questi--"

"I almost had them, I had the tickets in my hand! *SOB*SOB*"



No really, the "*SOB*SOB*" is in there. This guy is really broken up over it.

"Tickets, right, but I wanted to know if--"

"Tickets to the Maria Mercurial concert. They were almost mine. I even gave Grinder the money!"

"The hell kind of name is Grinder?"

"Poor Grinder. He got wasted by Lone Star. The morgue guys carried off what was left of him."

"Probably snatched him before he hit the ground. Those guys are like rocket vultures."



The fellow with the cape won't talk to us since he's on the phone, so let's talk to this guy.



"Uh, alright, so are you a shadowrunner or something?"

"You think I'm dumb! Done a hundred runs and I haven't lost one neuron yet!"

"Well you WERE referring to yourself in the third person..."

"English not Hamfist's first language. Shame on you for making assumptions."

"Anyway, you said you were a Decker?"

"Hamfist chop up cyberspace real good. Been in the grid more times than I care to remember."



Fortunately we have 4520 nuyen right now, so we can more than afford to hire Hamfist. Generally Hamfist is just an introduction to the fact that you CAN hire shadowrunners, but let's take him on anyway.



Shadowrunners can be great, one of their biggest advantages is that they work on similar AI to the enemy. NPC combatants will instantly lock on to their opponent instead of having to manually aim like we do. That means Hamfist here started unloading on the asshole in the window the second he appeared.

"...Hamfist notices we've killed three people and only been on the job for twenty seconds."

"Welcome to my life now, Hamfist."



Hey this guy looks sufficiently sketchy! What do you have to say?



"Errrr what"

"You don't seem to know what I mean! Are you a shadowrunner?"

"Oh, yeah, totally. Apparently I've been a Shadowrunner for a while."

"If you're hiring, they have almost any skill you want."

"The hiring process seems simple enough"

"You're going to need plenty of money... at least 500 Nuyen. If you're a fast talker you might negotiate your way to something better."

THIS IS THE ONLY WAY TO GET THE "NEGOTIATE" KEYWORD FOR AN OPTIONAL AND VERY MISSABLE SIDEQUEST



By the way, if we mention Lone Star to this guy, he'll set us up with a falsified Lone Star badge.



BY THE WAY CAN YOU SPOT WHICH WINDOW A GUNMAN POPPED OUT OF?



A bit tougher, but can you spot the item we're grabbing in this room?



This one's a bit less obvious since it's a black item, but you can still see the outline in the first image. Also don't worry, this is an optional item. this is an adventure game, but it's not full on King's Quest.



This office is a bit less violent. Let's ask the lady here what's up.



"I'm sure I didn't have you scheduled in anyway!"

Well that's all she'll give us. Despite telling us that, she doesn't actually care enough to do anything about us busting into her boss' office.



oh MY yes, now that we have a cyberdeck, we can enter The Matrix! Let's jack in to this computer here



"Ow, fuck"



"Great, so I wake up with a datajack, and the damn thing is broken."

"...Ahem"



Fortunately we just so happen to have someone who DIDN'T wake up as a corpse in the party. Maybe Hamfist will have better luck.




Much better!



The Matrix plays differently from the rest. It plays as a sort of minesweeper-esque game.



When you enter a tile, it'll say whether any IC is detected around you, but not where the IC is. If you step into a tile with IC on it, you'll take damage. You can use the information to get around the IC though.



Or you can just attack the IC outright. Either way, once we make it to those glass cube looking things, we can take the delicious, delicious data.



We can also jack out at any time. By the way, Hamfist got wrecked by the IC, as you can see from the top bar. The bottom bar is how much data you can store. I... don't think there's any part of the game where you can't take everything from a matrix section

So let's see what we got!



We jacked a bunch of bitcoins Suck on that, Glutman! We also found a file called DF_BADNEWS



A bit more information, maybe if we can find this Glutman guy, we can find out what the hell's going on.



By the way, Hamfist got REALLY messed up by the IC. Fortunately a nap at Jake's place fixes us both up.



"Scared of the morgue?"

"Why on earth would you want to go to the morgue?"

"I dunno, the only lead I have are those Maria Mercurial tickets, so why not?"

"..."



Now that we're wearing shades, the morticians no longer run away from us. Seriously.



"Nice shades! Do you always wear them indoors?"

"Hee hee, but seriously, I'm looking for a dude named Grinder"





We find the tickets in Grinder's file, but also...



We find this! This means we can finally use our phone!



We only have the one number, so let's give it a ring.



"Not entirely incorrect, are you alright? Why are you posing like that?"

"I got myself a new boyfriend and everything. The last of your stuff was just thrown out. You're still getting calls. Tell your buddies to stop calling us!"

"What?! I was dead for like an hour tops! What the hell do you mean you threw out all my stuff?! And who's calls?"

"Some Glutman guy keeps calling. His number is 934-782."

"Glutman? This is really important, what did he tell you?"

"Bye Jake!"



Well whatever, let's just call Glutman directly.



This is actually opens a dialogue directly to the secretary character we met before. We could have also just gone to her in person now that we have the Glutman keyword.

"Yo, I'm looking for Mr. Glutman"

"Mr. Glutman is out at the moment. He was going to The Cage club. Maybe you can find him there..."

So THAT'S why we were so desparate to get Grinder's tickets! Seriously though, you can't call Sassie at any point before you get Grinder's tickets and the credstick. You can get into The Cage before calling Sassie and the secretary, but Glutman won't be there until you have "The Cage" as a keyword. We have it now, so let's hit the club!



Located scenically beside the graveyard We could go in there, but it's better that we save that for later.

"Oh yeah, Hamfist."

"What?"



"Hold my gun for a bit."



The bouncer will block your way until he gets your tickets. Not really someone we'd want to deal with



So this is The Cage! It has it's own musical theme! I think one other place uses this, but most clubs use the same song as the Wasteland.

This is also the only club where no shadowrunners are available for hire, so this place blows.







You can talk to most people who aren't dancing in here, but no one really provides any good info. Let's just go right to Glutman.



"No shit, Glutman. Listen, I need some answers. Someone is trying to kill me, and succeeded once. I'd rather not go back to the morgue in a body bag again."

"Go now, my men hide you. No charge. Glutman owe you favor, ya! I fix everything! We hide you real good, you betcha![/img]

"You're going to clean this up? Alright good, once we're safe I have some questions about what happened."

"All in good time, Armitage! First things first, this a dangerous place for ya. Come with my men and I."




"By the way Jake, You wouldn't know nothin' about a grand goin' missing from one of my accounts, would ya?"

"Huh?"

"Nevermind, nevermind. Enjoy yer stay, Armitage!"



...the hell is this place.



"Oh you've got to be fucking kidding me! GLUTMAN!"

Well, you know what they say, out of the frying pan, into the caryards

"Seattle fucking SUCKS!"