Im offering 50,000 XDR for the laptop. Im offering zero for Donny Lester.

If you want to know whats on the laptop, thatll cost you 100,000.
Think carefully about what you really want.
Nelson Rockefeller, cracker

Liberty Boost
This adventure is an introduction to the setting of Bleeding Edge. This adventure is set in the storied country
of Liberia, on the west coast of Africa. Liberias lax weapon-control laws will give players the freedom to use
their proscribed equipment and weapons. This adventure should offer a mix of information-gathering,
breaking-and-entering, computer-hacking, and combat skills.

-- Post #43bc59bf-1b8b-696e-438f-190085ed0203-------------------- Nelson, who was understandably upset, put out a hit
Location: Liberia on Donny. Donny left the country to Liberia, a
Subject: BOOSTED country with lax law enforcement and lots of
broadband access. Donny rented an office from
Need one or more enterprising individuals to Janjay Quaiyan, a slum-lady in Paynesville.
acquire physical goods from Liberia. Offering
Donny wasnt in Liberia for more than 24 hours
50,000 XDR. Offer expires in three days.
when he mouthed off to Sundaygar the gang-boss
Serious inquiries only.
and his gang of water-sellers. The gang members
abducted him, worked him over, then shot him and
It is NOT okay to contact this poster with unsolicited services or offers.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- tossed his body in a dumpster. Janjay, annoyed that
her guest was making trouble that she didnt need,
Readme.txt sought to make a quick buck by selling off Donnys
only worthwhile possession his laptop, to her cousin
Two days ago, an enterprising anonymous hacker Garmuyu. Garmuyu is one of the enforcers for the
(who we will call Nelson Rockefeller) was using a Gola Overseers, a group of armed slavers who are
stolen time-share on a server farm to mine crypto- operating an illegal diamond mine in the neighboring
currencies. To keep his account there, he had an forest. Garmuyu turned the laptop over to his boss, a
inside man Donny Lester, an over-paid over- Russian Mafioso named Charne Slager.
worked code monkey. One day, Donny decided he
didnt need Nelson, and he moved the volume with
the cryptos to his own laptop. Donny thought he At the start of this adventure:
could liquidate the currency but the hacker had
Donny Lester is dead, a rotting corpse in a
locked the file with password protection. Donny had
dumpster.
just enough smarts to know how to hack a password,
but not enough to do it quickly. Janjay is back to business as usual, renting
and selling real estate.
Sundaygar & company are stealing water
Remember the assist bonus! Some Difficulty targets are and selling it to the locals at high rates
pretty high, being 15 or more. A single Player-Character The Gola Overseers are patrolling their
could have a very hard time beating that target but two open-air diamond mine
or more working together could still beat it. Encourage
your party members to work together. Charne Slager is trying to break the
Success in the first part can lead to an assist bonus in the encryption on the laptop.
Liberty Boost

next part. For example, successfully getting intel from

Sundaygars gang could give a +2 assist bonus to finding
the Gola Overseers.
Use the Me/us/them questions to spur action. If a player
says they cant think of what to do, ask them one or more
of the three personal questions. How do you see
yourself? How do your friends see you? How do your
enemies see you? Merely asking a question like this can
spur someone on to play their role in a fun and novel way. A1
 Getting the Players Involved The Trail to Liberia
If this is the first adventure, the Game Host can just Donny Lester is a reasonably effective criminal. He
give each Player-Character an excuse to be in Liberia. took a domestic flight from Ronald Reagan
In the world of the Permanent Emergency, Liberia is International Airport (Washington DC, US) to Roberts
home to some of the best telecommunications International Airport (Harbel, LR). Even in 2047, the
industry, as well as a port of convenience for several Robertsfield airport is still just one single airstrip with
legal and not-so-legal shipping companies. very little security.
If this isnt the first adventure, the Game Host should Liberian landscapes are still off-road, and the auto
find a reason the players would accept this job. industry is so back-dated, that taxi service is still done
Perhaps theyve worked with Nelson Rockefeller by human drivers. (If your Player-Characters decide
before. they need a friendly cab driver, you can use
Mardea Marah, a lean faced woman who has seen
Once players have accepted the job, tell the Players to it all. If they tip her well, she may give assist bonus to
add Get the laptop to Nelson Rockefeller to their list rolls, and the +2 or +3 from high rolls could help.)
of Goals. Ask the Players what skills and abilities their
If the Player-Characters successfully get the laptop to characters have to find information. Do they want to
Nelson, they will earn a reward of a new gift, as chosen by talk to the locals? Do they want to hack into the local
the Game Host. The most common reward is Insider airport cameras? The minimum Difficulty for finding
with Nelson Rockefeller but players who go above and any trails is 10. (Dont forget the possible +2 assist
beyond may earn better gifts, such as Veteran, Master bonus from using the database software.) If our
Occupation, or a Skill Specialty. The new gift should heroes can get any leads at all, all evidence points to
reflect something the Player-Character did during Donny Lester getting in a cab and going to
the adventure. Paynesville.

Who is Nelson Rockefeller? Paynesville and Omega Town

Nelson only communicates via text. He (or she?) is an At the dawn of the 20th century, Liberia was in the
identity thief and highly skilled hacker. After all, throes of its second civil war. The capital city of
Nelson encrypted the files that hold the crypto- Monrovia, and the eastern suburb of Paynesville,
currency keys at an expert level (Difficulty 30). were the sites of widespread slaughter of civilians.
After 2003, democratic elections settled, and
Nelson has a deadline of three days because crypto-
Monrovia enjoyed a tech boom, with many
currencies are notoriously speculative. In three days,
businesses moving in.
the other miners of this type of coin, all over the
world, will have mined so many other valid keys as to In the last decade of austerity following Mad Tuesday,
make the value of the stolen coins to drop in value. a wave of neoliberalist government sentiment has
If the Player-Characters can do some convincing privatized many services. Rising unemployment has
(Difficulty 20), they can convince Nelson to extend the led people to look for work elsewhere, and large
deadline for a few more days. Its a bit easier stretches of Paynesville are still derelict. A few seaside
(Difficulty 15) to convince Nelson to forward them an locations suffered earthquake damage from the Ring
advance (up to 10,000, with good rolls) or to of Fire quakes and still havent been repaired.
acquire other services for them (such as plane
tickets).
Trying to hack the net to find out who Nelson really is, Mardea Marah Taxi Driver
is rather difficult (Difficulty 25) and if they try,
(Monrovia-Paynesville-Harbel, LR)
Nelson will call down his Bot-Net, which will raise the
Difficulty by 10 for a while and will make Nelson Str -1, Dex +1, Con -1, Int 0, Wis +1, Cha 0
pretty mad. Master Taxi Driver (+5 to do a taxi drivers job)
Nelson will use a burner email account to send the Local Knowledge of Liberia (+5 to all rolls to know stuff in Liberia)
Liberty Boost

Player-Characters all the information he has on Driving skill (3d6+2 or 12, increases to 3d6+7 or 17 when
Donny Lester. (This file counts as a Database Software driving a taxi),
on Donny Lester, which takes up 1 Program slot and Observation skill (3d6+Int+Wis or 11)
gives a +2 bonus on rolls relevant to Donny Lester.) Sport Outfit (Armor +2, Athletics +2)
Headset Phone (Social Media)
Small Pistol (25m+, 2d6+2, Effect Damage 14,
Critical Effect 16, Ammo: High)
A2 Dodge 2d6+2, Soak 2d6+2
The trail after Donny Lester leads to Omega Town, an But Player-Characters will have to somehow beat a
inland borough of Paynesville, and one that was hit Difficulty of 20 or more to get her to give up that she
hard by the bust economy. Once there, he disappears. knows Donny is dead and that she sold off his stuff.
Theres no credit or debit trails. Getting more leads on Then shell give up that she sold the stuff to her cousin
Donny will require more legwork. Players may want Garmuyu, who is one of the Gola Overseers.
to double-up and to assist one another. Paynesville
has numerous security cameras to be hacked into,
The Empty Office Building
people to be interviewed, and trails to follow. Ask
your players what talents and abilities they can bring Breaking into the office building is no trivial task. The
to bear, and then work with it. locks are physical, and the office has cameras. Only
Beating a Difficulty of 10 will reveal signs that Donny skilled thieves could get in, undetected. (Difficulty 15,
Lester was here. He was a loud, obnoxious, pasty- and coming back at night with the cover of darkness
faced American who made no friends. Rolling 15 or would give a +2 assist bonus.)
more will get evidence (from gossipy locals, or blurry Once inside, the place is empty, with doors wide open
surveillance footage, etc.) that Donny got into a fight and wide will divide to suit spaces. Only two
with some guys, who then rode away on a ten- interior doors are locked: the utility closet (which has
wheeler truck. The more inventive your players are, the vacuum robot, cleaning supplies and the
and the better they roll, the more details you should buildings computer) and office #13. The interior locks
give out. are easily forced (Difficulty 10). Office #13 has been
Donny Lester is the sole renter in a simple two-story vacuumed recently (unlike everything else, so
office building. The building couldnt look more drab: suspicious!). Good intel gathering rolls (10 or more)
concrete, brutalist construction, with wireless will reveal indentations in the carpet, crumbs from
cameras. The building is owned by Janjay Quaiyan, food, marks of a sleeping bag, etc. all signs that
but theres no record of Lester renting it. someone was living here. Most notably absent are
Donnys things.

Dealing with Janjay the Landlady Successful intel gathering on Donnys last
whereabouts should give a +2 assist bonus (or more)
Janjay has a public phone number and email address on future rolls to find him. Player-Characters with
she is a realtor, after all, and she owns way too unusual science or forensics may find clues such as
much property in the Omega Town district that she DNA traces, obscure footprints, etc. that will lead to
wants to unload. Subterfuge to get an interview with where the last fight took place.
her is relatively easy (Difficulty 10). Rolls to gather
information on Janjay can be used as an assist bonus
Sundaygar and his Water-Sellers
on later attempts to convince her to give up Donny.
If confronted about Donny, Janjay will lie and claim In this period of austerity, good drinking water is
she doesnt know him. Beating a Difficulty of 15 will hard to find. Most everyone in Paynesville resorts to
get her to admit that she rented him the property bottled water. Corruption runs rampant, with various
and that she knows that Sundaygars gang were seen criminals bribing, stealing, and killing to control the
roughing him up. bottled water supply.
Omega Town is under the control of Sundaygar. He
has his boys pick up the water directly from the
Nuraco Bottling Plant on the coast, then he sells it to
the locals at a huge markup. Donny Lester made
Janjay Quaiyan Land Owner and trouble on the first day, and then said some things he
shouldnt have, to some gangsters who were having a
Real-Estate Agent (Paynesville, LR) bad day and who had no patience for some fat
Str 0, Dex 0, Con 0, Int 0, Wis 0, Cha 0 American who didnt understand how things were
Master Realtor (+5 to do a realtors job) done. Donny was taken back to Sundaygars
Insider with Gola Slavers (+5 to all rolls to deal with them) warehouse, worked over, killed, and thrown in the
Local Knowledge of Liberia (+5 to all rolls to know stuff in Liberia) onsite dumpster, where hell be picked up in a
Liberty Boost

Deceit skill few days.

Social Media skill
Business Outfit (Social Media, Data-base of
owned properties)
Incapacitating Spray (1m++, 3d6, Effect 2d6+Con+Wis
vs. 10 or Confused, Critical Effect 2d6+Con+Wis vs. 13
or Confused, Ammo: High)
Dodge 2d6, Soak 2d6 A3
 Sundaygars men spend the day driving around in
three stolen trucks, making the rounds to sell bottled
Gola Rainforest National Park and
water to locals. At night, they either hole up in the Secret Diamond Mine
warehouse to play video games or to party or they
The Gola Rainforest National Park Forest is about
go into Monrovia proper, to party. His warehouse is
60km northwest of Omega Town in Paynesville, and
protected on all sides by an opaque wall and
its over the border into the neighboring country of
automatic gates, with ladar motion sensors and other
Sierra Leone. It was once teeming with wildlife.
sophisticated systems to keep his competitors out. (Its
However, years of poaching from the desperately
at least a Difficulty 15 to get past it.) Getting into his
poor have left only a few desperate animals and small
compound and searching will turn up such things as
game. The only taxi driver who would even brave
his arms stash, his drug stash, and the dumpster with
driving through here is Mardea, and even she can
Donnys body in it. (No laptop.)
only take the players to the Lofa-Mano National Park,
Player-Characters eager for violence may get into a fight on the Liberian side of the border (which is
with Sundaygars men. (Engaging in violence in the city about 40km).
limits will raise the Player-Characters profiles by +1 or
more.) The gangsters will assume any plain-clothes
people that they engage with are with a rival gang.
If the players interrogate Sundaygar, or any of his
men, they will freely confess to murdering Donny
Lester because he was a loud-mouthed jerk and they
didnt like him.
Gola Overseers 4+1 (Garmuyu) Slavers
The only loot the gang has is in their safe: 700 in
(Gola, SL)
kruggerands and five kilos of cocaine that they cant
find a buyer for. (Its possibly worth 20,000 or more.) Str 0, Dex 0, Con 0, Int 0, Wis 0, Cha 0
Job: Mercenary (+2 to do a mercenarys job)
Insider with Russian Mafia (+5 to all rolls to deal with the
Russian Mafia)
Water-Sellers 9 Gangsters Local Knowledge of Sierra Leone (+5 to all rolls to know
(Paynesville, LR) stuff in Sierra Leone)
Str 0, Dex 0, Con 0, Int 0, Wis 0, Cha 0 Evasion skill
Observaton skill
Job: Criminal (+2 to do a criminals job)
Shooting skill
Insider with Omega-Town Water Sellers (+5 to all rolls to Veteran (+2 to attacks, counters, and dodges)
deal with Omega-Town Water Sellers)
SWAT Outfit (Armor +2d6+2, Policing +2, Social Media,
Local Knowledge of Liberia (+5 to all rolls to know stuff in Liberia)
Sensory Enhancement)
Evasion skill
Assault Rifle (100m++, 3d6+4 or 14, Effect Damage 15,
Shooting skill
Critical Damage 20, Ammo: High) + 3 reloads
Gang Outfit (Armor +2, Streetwise +2)
Dodge 3d6+2 or 12, Soak 4d6+2
Burner Phone (Social Media, Expires, Untraceable)
Submachinegun (50m++, 3d6+2 or 12, Effect Damage 12,
Critical Damage 15, Ammo: High) Charne Slager Russian Capo (Gola, SL)
Dodge 3d6 or 10, Soak 2d6+2 Str +3, Dex -1, Con +1, Int +1, Wis +1, Cha +1
Master Mercenary (+5 to do a mercenarys job)
Sundaygar Head Gangster Insider with Russian Mafia (+5 to all rolls to deal with the
Russian Mafia)
(Paynesville, LR) Computing Skill
Str +1, Dex +1, Con +1, Int +1, Wis +1, Cha +1 Evasion skill
Master Criminal (+5 to do a criminals job) Fighting skill
Insider with Omega-Town Water Sellers (+5 to all rolls to Shooting skill
deal with Omega-Town Water Sellers) Cyber Body
Liberty Boost

Local Knowledge of Liberia (+5 to all rolls to know stuff in Liberia) Veteran (+2 to attacks, counters, and dodges)
Evasion skill Paramilitary Outfit (Armor 2d6+Str; Policing +2, Sensory
Shooting skill Enhancement, MILSPEC Intrusion Counter-Measures,
2 more slots: Injection Attack, Social Media)
Gang Outfit (Armor +2, Streetwise +2)
Machine Pistol with Smart Sighting (25m+, 3d6+9 or 19,
Burner Phone (Social Media, Expires, Untraceable) Effect Damage 13, Critical Damage 16, Ammo: Low)
Submachinegun (50m++, 3d6+7 or 17, Effect Damage 13, + 6 reloads
Critical Damage 16, Ammo: High) Dodge 3d6+2 or 12, Soak 4d6+4
A4 Dodge 3d6+2 or 12, Soak 2d6+3 Tap Cyber Body for one +5 Soak Bonus
The Gola Diamond Mine can only be reached on foot
through 20km of thick forest. (Difficulty 10, at least.)
Aftermath
Within 10km of the place is a perimeter of wireless If the Player-Characters can get the laptop within the
cameras which need to be evaded. (Difficulty 15 to three-day time limit, they may call into Nelson, who
defeat, through hacking or stealth or what have you.) will arrange for an overnight shipment to a random
Gola Overseers carry RFID tags that dont set off any destination in the US. Once the players drop the
alarms (Difficulty 20 to fake those). package off in the city for shipping, Nelson will
The mine is about 30 workers, all pathetic people transfer the money. (Hes not that worried about
stolen from their homes and forced at gunpoint to getting ripped off, at this point.)
dig. The edges of the mine are draped in camouflage Returning the laptop to Nelson accomplishes the goal
netting, but the pit itself is visible from the air. The pit and earns a free gift. The most common award is
is a cone, 400m across and 40m deep. (This area is Insider with Nelson Rockefeller, which gives the
blurred out on most satellite photos due to hacking Player-Character a +5 bonus to convince Nelson to
Difficulty 20 to circumvent this.) help them in the future. (Most players will elect to
There are always at least 3 mercenaries on duty, with retain this gift for the +5 XP. But they may wait an
2 of them with overlapping zones of fire. (In game adventure or two before cashing in.)
terms, with take-10 and assist bonus on guard duty, The Player Characters may try to liquidate the crypto-
thats a Difficulty of 14 to get past them.) currencies themselves. Decrypting the laptop
Theres four barracks: two with no air conditioning, requires brains (Int) and social-engineering (Cha) and
one with good air conditioning, and one with a will need to beat a Challenge of 300, with a maximum
fantastic air conditioner, a gasoline generator, and a of 10 tries, one per hour harsh, but not impossible. If
satellite dish. This fancier trailer belongs to Charne the players can crack it in the first three days, they
Slager, the Russian Mafoso. He has the laptop and hes can liquidate the cryptos on various dark.nets for
trying to decrypt it to get into the files. (He doesnt 5,000,000. If they take longer than that, the market
know what they are, but he figures he should try.) crashes, and theyre lucky to get 500. When Nelson
The Player-Characters will have to figure out how to finds out about the liquidation, they will have earned
get the laptop out of this fortified place. Many Player- him as an enemy.
Characters will try to sneak in, or perhaps to infiltrate Your players may come up with some other strange
the compound by pretending to be one of the slaves way of resolving everything. Have fun! The
or even one of the Overseers. A robot jockey could try adventure is yours to behold.
to sneak a drone past the sensors. Heavily-armed After the adventure is over and the game session has
Player-Characters might consider direct combat. ended, debrief the players. Ask them what worked
Charne and the Overseers will fight to protect the and what didnt. Are there any rules they were
mine, but they will give up if they suffer 50% or more confused about? Whether they have any criticisms
casualties, and they will flee into forest. or not, participating in the debriefing is worth +1 XP.
If Charne survives, he and his Mafia will become a
future enemy of the Player-Characters. Make a note,
and when later Watch Checks come up positive, the
Russian Mafia may take action.

Liberty Boost

A5