A trope, a seed
Back in the 90s, my GM ran a "Thieve's guild" adventure for D&D. You know the drill: something's going on in town, the PCs track a trail and find a secret entrance to a dungeon, they realize there's a thieves' guild creating the trouble, they deal with it and get the treasure. Then I found a few fan-written "thieve's guild" but had no resemblance to my friend's, just the main concept. Years later, while trying to wrap my head aroung Mage, I asked a friend what would be the "thieve's guild" equivalent for Mage (he said it was "defend a node"). I now call these "seeds", or maybe tropes (but I wouldn't call them that for a long while).
The milk run
Fast-forward to just a few years ago... I had discovered Shadowrun and felt dry with ideas for getting started. I googled for a while and came up with a reddit post recommending a "Milk run". Basically, have the crew tasked with snatching something from someone (the post suggests swapping briefcases), most likely a courier, and then just let them see how they go about it.
Perhaps you have to let them figure out how to track the mark or maybe give them a nudge. They get to decide if they want to do it stealthily or forcefully. Maybe the police arrives. Maybe the courier is armed and trained. And of course, maybe the patron never intended to pay them after delivery anyway.
Do you have any go-to seeds you like to use for SciFi games?
Image by ttrpg.network/u/roflo1, based on milk in a bottle, Matt Bango, CC0 and Bol, Petit déjeuner, Muesli.
I ran a shadowrun adventure once. I called it "Save the Cat". A high-level specialist for implants had an "accident" and went hiding in a private clinic. His problem is that his cat is still at home. The characters are tasked to fetch the cat and bring it to a defined safe location. He does not trust his own companies security, as he suspects them to be involved in the crash.
The twists: a) the "cat" is a full-grown tiger. b) it is stuffed to the brim with experimental implants. c) the people who put this guy in hospital are actually after the "cat", but they only know that it is a "large orange cat with stripes".
When the characters finally arrive at the villa, the other guys are already there. But they did not get the codes to program a "calming device" like the characters did (this was a cyber side adventure to get some extra code), so the "cat" has already reduced them to managable numbers.
Additional challenge: the calming device that allows the characters to just lead the cat on a leash does not always work. Like close to power lines...