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Posted by: Wakshaani Mar 2 2016, 09:14 PM

http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/176342/Shadowrun-Market-Panic-Campaign-Book?src=slider_view

Lots more to read than usual, so it might take a few days for discussion to start rolling.

Posted by: Uli Mar 2 2016, 11:04 PM

I have a quick question beforehand: Does Market Panic have crunchy stuff and gear?

Posted by: Prime Mover Mar 2 2016, 11:57 PM

Didn't see any gear on first pass through.
Denver (Serrated Edge) released today too.

Posted by: Sendaz Mar 3 2016, 12:14 AM

Just got it and doing some quick scanning.

There is no gear or crunchy rule stuff here that I can see.

What it DOES have is a rundown on the corporate life, the big 10 as well as the CC.

From following a corporate drone through their daily grind (sort of) to a who's who within the various megas along with juicy tidbits like what's really bugging Damien Knight.

We get to see the CC in action along with things like the Corporate Audits. And no, doesn't look like Harley got a seat as a CC Justice. Maybe next Edition.

So if you thought they would have a new line of heavy armoured limos or discreet Form fitting bodyguard power armor, this is not the book for that.

If you want to get caught up on current events and some not so public events, or just want some ideas for runs, then this may be right for you

Should I be nervous that the description of the Denver adventure starts with "SCALPEL OF HATE" ?
Please tell me this isn't War 2.0 about to kick off by having it turn up as an element migrating from adventure to adventure.

Posted by: Wakshaani Mar 3 2016, 06:10 AM

Nope. 100% crunch-free, so those of you still using 4th can follow the timeline without having to change anything.

Posted by: Ryu Mar 3 2016, 12:00 PM

That´s good to hear, I´ll have a look then

Posted by: Uli Mar 3 2016, 12:03 PM

Thanks guys. Actually I appreciate the book is crunch free. It's always bothering to go through over a dozen book to find all crunch options.

Also the older corp books didnt have crunch either (except for the Ford Smartcar, I think).

Posted by: Bull Mar 3 2016, 10:30 PM

Just did a quick skim, and far as I can tell, it has nothing to do with that.

Posted by: Sendaz Mar 3 2016, 10:32 PM

Thanks Bull

Still going through Market Panic right now, and it's great reading, might get this later.

Posted by: Zednark Mar 4 2016, 04:40 AM

Read the intro, Ares and Aztech sections, good stuff so far. I'm halfway through Evo. I liked the intro in particular.

Posted by: Tycho Mar 4 2016, 07:24 AM

Question: Are there Infos on "Running for Ares/..." or "Running against Ares/..." or General Security Philosophies of the different Megacorps?

Things an GM can use to flesh out the differences between the Megocorps other than the Logos on the Walls.

Posted by: Sendaz Mar 4 2016, 08:19 AM

Yes and No.

They all approach it to some degree, how it is written out varies by corp.

A couple of the Corps like the Azzies and Ares has a clear section for doing Runs FOR or AGAINST them with about a half page devoted to each side of the coin.

The other corp chapters approach them differently. SK has it all lumped into one. Shiawase doesn't specifically spell it out, but it does present a lot of potential plot hooks you can build runs on.

Do not expect to see bullet point lists clearly listing specific plot hooks, it's just in the fluff, but there is plenty there to pick and choose from as you read about the corp goals, upcoming releases, who has crossed them or they plan to cross, and more.
Likewise you won't see them giving any specific ratings on their people, so how you stat that Jaguar Guard is left to your own discretion.

The Chapters do give each corp their own flavour and recounting of its history along with recent events, so yeah a GM can get a pretty good feel for them so they are more than just changing the logo on the office window.

Posted by: Blade Mar 4 2016, 09:09 AM

Is it truly set in the Shadowrun 2070s or is it our 2016 with name changed and some cyber and magic sprinkled on top?

Posted by: Sendaz Mar 4 2016, 09:52 AM

Not sure what you are meaning.
The SR universe pretty much started its divergence back in the 80s, from Mondale getting the presidency to all the events in the Awakening so the timeline & tech in SR is quite a bit different than what we have in the here and now.

Which does create some tense points when arguing about tech like nanobots and the cloud since SR went one route with it and some of it is still relevant/realistic while some bits have proven to work in other ways in reality vs how SR presents it.

Posted by: FriendoftheDork Mar 4 2016, 12:22 PM

How relevant would the fluff be to a 2050 campaign? I do like the focus on fluff and corporate, might be sorely lacking in the runner-centric books.

Posted by: hermit Mar 4 2016, 12:41 PM

It does develop on from Corporate Dossier and takes into account published adventures, such as the Horizon trilogy. Better than average research, and during my skim I didn't notice any massive screwups like with Rigger 5's bizarre reliting of products.


Not at all, being set nearly 30 years in the in-game future. Get yourself a PDF or hardcopy (secondhand, check ebay and amazon) of Corporate Shadowfiles then, the old 2050s Corp book. Shadowrun 2050 also has a lot of information on the 2050s corporate scene, as does the Shadowrun Returns: Hong Kong sourcebook.

---

A bit of a pity you made Sumitomo a part of MCT (though that does explain it's size). I like Sumitomo. For one, it has a history, something all Shadowrun Japanocorps conspicuously lack (by "history" I mean "it was founded at the same time as the Virginia Cominion"). Plus, their Logo is so quintessentially Japanese design. I wish MCT and Renraku had such a Logo.

Posted by: Blade Mar 4 2016, 02:22 PM

I was mostly saying this in light of what there was in Attitude, where many things about the daily life could be lifted from a book about today's life, replacing "Internet" with "the Matrix" and adding some additional stuff about magic and cyber on top.

So I'd like to know stuff like:
- Are wage-slaves described as 2016 employees, or are they actual wage-slaves?
- Are corps seen as Apple/Google/Exxon/General Electrics or as they correctly described as "all these together and much more"?
etc.

Posted by: Sendaz Mar 4 2016, 04:27 PM

Ah that is a fair question.

The book starts off on a chapter following a wageslave through his day, with the reporter for a local Paper following him around taking in the wage slave life and all it entails.

It is actually well done and there are sideboxes capitalizing on certain aspects, like what drones may be expected to dress like and what corp group bonding activities they can get stuck with along with Metahuman Job rights.
And it's not just their life, but how a Runner may make use of it like what kind of incentives you may need to turn a drone so he passes you some intel or leaves a certain door unlocked at the right time.
They even list the top 10 BTL chips drones use as an escape from their dreary life along with the growing danger it presents.
It does a fair job on really giving you a feel for being under constant surveillance, corp peer pressure, internal politics, unwinding with your colleagues afterwards and even a twist ending.

As for the corps, they go into the origins of the corps and their current attitudes and acquisitions along with current troubles and issues for the future.
You also have to remember these are Triple As.
So you can not just go oh "Ares = Guns like Exxon = Oil" because the Corps are so much more multi-faceted that that and they go into that here.
Ares for example is also big into space research.
Now whether this is just a means to put bigger guns into space or not is another question or maybe they just want a bug-free getaway, but it is a branching none the less.
Yes they have their main shticks, the areas they excel in, but the constant drive for the almighty nuyen means they ALL have their fingers in ALOT of pies and they regularly step on each other's toes.
Which in the end means more work for us.


If I have one complaint it is the fallout from the Boston Lockdown is still coming down and still a lot of questions remain so when this does it may be a big game changer for the corp left holding the bag.

But I can see why they did this as this will be having impacts for years down the road and we did need a current update on the big 10.

Just keep in mind Boston and the Corp Audit as well as the New SIN system they keep hinting at can still throw everyone a curveball, which will probably be the basis for a number of forthcoming adventures/missions.

Posted by: hermit Mar 4 2016, 05:03 PM

Running Review (writing as I go)

Opening Fiction: Well written, great grasp on the Gibson spirit that's always been at Shadowrun's core, but deeply flawed when it comes to the background. I like the atmosphere, the way the main character "awakens" into a runner, and the brief but impactful description of the daily madness of corporate life (Brazil comes to mind). But it is at many times ill-fit with the Shadowrun background. When is this story supposed to take place? Apparently before 2060, because Fuchi buys up a company. Still, the protagonist goes into the Matrix with his commlink. Also, the UCAS never was engaged, militarily in Guatemala, not least becasue Guatemala stopped existing in the 2020s. While I appreciate the generic trope of "the Mesoamerican war" in Cyberpunk fiction, this is not the place, I'm afraid.

In constructive criticsm, Yucatán ould offer a good alternative for Guatremala. Same shit, but canon conforming. similarly, NeoNET instead of Fuchi America (same company, different name). With a legycy system like Shadowrun, it's such little touches that make all the difference.

Posted by: Nath Mar 4 2016, 11:38 PM

Much later according to the Aztlan SB.

It depends on the story told (as I haven't read it). As far as the canon went, no foreign countries (or megacorporations) officially sent troops to fight during the civil war in Yucatan. But Amazonia, NAN, Tir Tairngire and CAS may have provided covert support.

Also, in Corporate Guide, by 2072, Neonet was still using "Fuchi" as a brandname for Fuchi Orbital and Fuchi Consumer Electronics, while Renraku still maintained Fuchi Corporate Services.

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Mar 5 2016, 09:02 AM

The S-K chapter should feel different, as it shows, that Lofwyr organize his corp more like a country (specifically like the old Roman Empire), instead of an ordinary corp. So his corp often just do stuff for their own 'population' and not for the open market.

Posted by: hermit Mar 5 2016, 03:08 PM

Yeesh, it was that late? Thanks for the catch. (Damn ...)


Or mercenaries, or troops "on holiday", like all those Russian "volunteers" in Ukraine and Syria.


I thought so too at first, but into the next chapter, Fuchi was repeatedly identified as the AAA that had bought Great American Products (a company based in Singapore, yay for the Bridge Trilogy reference).

-----

Running Review (cont'd)

A Day in the Life of Karl Denisovic
There's a lot of good to be said about this. This vision of corporate life doesn't feel like 2010-with-elves like Attitude did. It does feel appropriately oppressive and does take into account many important things - corporate culture, constant surveillance, corporate sousveillance and how the corp structures their employees lives. Many brand name-drops and procuring oddities like the karmic Feng Shui style chairs give a good feel of a place where everything s corporate-owned and -branded. And I really like the way the SimSense addiction was worked in without being obnoxiously "Just Say No!". It's stuff we can see happening in the near future, but not today. Exactly how it should be done. I really like the sidebars with top 10 movie and SimSense/BTL downloads (despite mixing up BTL and SimSense again, see below).

And for the most part, he gets the Shadowrun feel right (if not the facts, and honestly, there are not enough mages to waste them in administering a random marketing department, even if his boss only has a flicker of talent). He even gets the mount doom impression of the Rainier right - better than most Shadowrun writings, actually. Seems like he's actually been to Seattle (he also appropriately covers geography. But where is there a Gainesville to be a slum in Seattle? Is this supposed to be part of New Puyallup?).

However. And here we go. Karl works for Fuchi. In 2077. Great research here, Chris Lites (*slowclap*). Or rather, great job getting the new guy up to speed, Jason (*slowclap*). Fuchi, in 2077. Because fuck continuity, the minimum viable product is what counts.

I'm not saying the writing is bad. It is good. It is just not very close to Shadowrun canon. For instance, the major networks all belong to one or another megacorporation - so why should the Ares anchorman on an Ares network's Ares sponsorship be some kind of shock to anyone, let alone a veteran runner like Sounder? And a shadowrun AI isn't what the author thinks it is - that would be an Agent. A Shadowrun AI is a spooky gjhost of the Matrix, not every software system that uses AI principles. Plus, AI prefer to be called Digital Intelligences . Again, in Netrunner or Neuromancer (Angie Mitchell's house comes to mind), this would be perfectly fine, but not in shadowrun. that's the catch about writing for a world with such a legacy. And that's where the publisher ought to give new guys a hand - or have a fluff bible of some kind, or a Wiki maybe.

Bottle imp? More CP2020 lingo? that should also be Agent, or maybe Fetch. S&K? Commonly written SK. It is Saeder-Krupp and not Saeder and Krupp. The Fuchi HQ is where, Singapore? Such things matter. And by "related to VITAS", you mean related to AIPS? Because VITAS is a virus-induced toxic shock plague which is not at all related to hero syndrome.

Also, BTL and SimSense are not the same. I cannot blame Chris here, though; it seems half the writers by now don't understand that.

By and large a good writeup, but one that would have really profited from fact-cghecking, the existence of a fluff bible for new authors, and proofreading (once it's Awakening: 1948, then "there be dragon out there" ... such things happen; this is why there are proof readers. Ah, classic CGL. Good to great writing, diminished by lack of interest in a quality product.

Posted by: Wakshaani Mar 5 2016, 04:38 PM

Keep it rolling, Hermit. Feedback's vital, both the good and bad. (And, yes, the idea of a setting Bible's a good one. There are some parts, but nota whole. Jotting that down.) The good gets mentioned less, but I legitimately appreciate it all.

(Not my chapter, mind you, but it still matters.)

Posted by: Sengir Mar 5 2016, 08:37 PM

They don't have to be "spooky ghosts", but every single AI in Shadowrun is a spontaneous emergence event. You don't just have for axple a run-of-the-mill justice AI like in CP2020, an AI which happens to be a judge would be a major special snowflake.

Posted by: hermit Mar 6 2016, 01:01 AM

While mostly in German, I have fairly detailed corporate lists myself. I'd even translate them (send me a PM with an email, and I'll email a translated sample).

Also, I am not trying to understate the good - I liked Chris' stuff, just feel it would have massively benefitted from more help offered to get him into the nitty-gritty of SR canon, and some editorial polishing. I [i]like[i] CP2020 and Gibson references, it's what I myself try to inject into my games as often as I can get away with it. And for the sake of every new SR writer I'd really, really hope there'll be a setting bible or wiki (the wiki probably is a better medium, since it can be expanded, accessed and shared more easily). Because it must be extremely intimidating for a writer to have to try and work with such a long-standing setting - mistakes like the ones I noted above are are unavoidable if there is no guide for the new guys.

-------------------

Rolling Review (cont'd):

Courting Disaster
A chapter about the Corp Court, headed by a one-page short about a spy girl injecting dubious memos into the CC system. Not badly written, but it should be said I liked the style Chris Lite wrote his chapter in better. This chapter, thoughm is well-researched. It goes into the history of the court (didn't look up the dates, but the outline reads correct), the Veracruz settlement (though it's referred to as the Aztechnology Crisis here), and an outline of the SR4 Matrix and why it went wireless mesh that actually is among the best and most concise summaries I have read to date. Then comes a summary of the de la Mar metaplot, which also is well written and concise, and a reminder what the Dickens Project/Justice Hino plot as all about. This is accompanied with a bizarre image of a female justice in what looks like a future US supreme court justice robe being led away from what looks like of of the smaller courtrooms of the US Supreme Court by armored police officers while Harlequin the Supreme Court judge laughs at her between holographic judges. While this does tell a story, it is one that's never adressed anywhere, it seems, and thus this artwork that, by itself, is great, in it's specificness seems very oddly placed.

What follows is laying out more metaplot - how the CC started the Megacorp Audit to scramble the Big 10, how they were understandably unimpressed by the callous treatment of Justice Hino, and how MCT came to take over Mitsubishi Motors because of that Audit. All neat and clean and, as far as I could tell, with no significant continuity errors. This is followed up by a portrayal of CC justices and a picture of Zurich-Orbital. Interestingly, Saeder-Krupp's Grand Inquisitor (and corp fashion icon) now apparently is a CC justice, which kind of makes me wonder if SK's CFS problems have just gone away or if this is some other spiel of Lofwyr's. A description of the CC's infrastructure rounds out this chapter.

This is decent and solid writing. It lacks the gibson references and style of the previous chapter, but also avoids it's weak points. Whoever wrote this either is a long-standing SR fan or did decent research. Not much to criticise really.

Posted by: binarywraith Mar 7 2016, 10:58 AM

Standard issue for CGL books, then. Details the line producer or editors should have caught, but probably missed because the team lost most of the people who were really conversant with the lore.

Posted by: Blade Mar 7 2016, 04:14 PM

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Mar 8 2016, 11:19 PM

After you've read it, I would like to hear your comments and feedback to my S-K chapter.

Posted by: Zednark Mar 9 2016, 05:09 AM

Some thoughts upon finishing the book:

- It would have benefited from a few gear write ups. Not because fluff books can't stand on their own, but because some of the write ups mention specific gear. In fact, the Ares section is built around the failure of the Ares Excalibur, and I don't think we've seen its stats yet. That's kinda like saying that the Ares Predator is the main shadowrunning sidearm, then hiding it in a supplement no one bought.

- A more unified format would have been handy. For example, Ares and Aztechnology have write ups for Running for/against Ares/Aztechnology, but most of the others didn't, even though that would be helpful.

- The book ends abruptly. One minute, you're reading up on Wuxing, then you turn the page and it's over. It wasn't in the middle of a paragraph, but there was no "conclusion" to the Wuxing section, or for the book overall. Sloppy.

- I'd have liked a quick "Everybody else" section. You know, quick, ten paragraph write ups of AAs of import. Universal Omnitech, Lone Star, DocWagon, etc. Some of them are mentioned, but in another corp's chapter and always in the context of how they relate to a specific AAA.

Otherwise though, a solid book.

Posted by: Fabe Mar 9 2016, 05:14 AM

I believe the stats for the Excalibur were in the 4th edtion book War. If I recall there was some dissatisfaction with the rules/stats for battle rifles.

Posted by: Zednark Mar 9 2016, 05:29 AM

I meant in 5e. Especially since most of the fallout seemed to happen in 2075 onwards.

Posted by: Wakshaani Mar 9 2016, 12:52 PM

There was a double-A section, but the book was running too long as it is, so that part was clipped off and will be used in a Future Product ™. Unfortunately, that means that the wrap-up feel is kind of missing, resulting in that sudden fin! that you mentioned.

Posted by: Fabe Mar 9 2016, 03:48 PM

A book featuring the top double A rated corps might be useful with one of them about to rise to triple A status while one of the big ten about to lose it's triple a status.

Posted by: Wakshaani Mar 9 2016, 04:21 PM

That would, indeed, be an excellent idea. I can say no more than that.

Posted by: Sendaz Mar 9 2016, 07:23 PM

They should include this event in a set of Missions Adventures with the one covering the fall from AAA to AA being called 'Kissing Your A Goodbye'

Posted by: Bull Mar 10 2016, 01:14 PM

The fall of a AAA is (was?) tied to the Shadowrun Chronicles game, as is Lockdown. I'm not entirely certain what's happening in regards to Chronicles these days, but I think that's one reason those plots are moving so slow.

Posted by: Jaid Mar 10 2016, 02:50 PM

wouldn't it make sense to still write a conclusion for each section? i mean, if you change the project, then change it properly... still means sloppy editing and production values. obviously can't blame the writers if the rug is yanked out from under their feet at the last moment, but if you're writing a chapter on wuxing, shouldn't you write a conclusion to that chapter as well?

Posted by: Blade Mar 10 2016, 03:33 PM

So I take it the SR line is still missing an editor?

Posted by: Sendaz Mar 10 2016, 05:13 PM

I remember Marzhin over on the other site mentioned the ending on the http://forums.shadowruntabletop.com/index.php?topic=20787.msg372235#msg372235 had rumblings, but no end result effects on the corps yet.

Think that was supposed to be followed up in later sections to be released down the road, but I do not recall hearing anything to date adding to this.

Posted by: hermit Mar 14 2016, 12:18 PM

Running Review (cont'd)

Ares
It started out so well. I felt really postive about this book. But then came this chapter. And it stalled me for more than a week in its awfulness.

I don't know precisely, but I suppose this is the same writer who wrote the Ares blurb in stormfront. Same style, same shit. His insistence on doubling down on his nonsense would be fascinating, were it not also incredibly stupid and self-righteous.

Rather than clear up the ridiculousness of the Ares Excalibur situation with a bit of rationalization, the author doubles down on the stupid by insisting both that Ares really would run a worldwide ad campaign for a product that is illegal to own in the first place (who are these ads supposed to advertise to?) and that this niche-within-a-tiny-niche-product failing epically would really cause a loss of consumer confidence that would make people smash their Apple iCom, set their GMC on fire, never fly American again and make their bosses cut ties with Hard Corps immediately because having no security apparently is better than having a security provider who also produced a broken niche-within-a-niche product. Ludicrous.

But it gets worse.

Here's the paragraph that stopped me cold for the past eight days:

Bold text mine, italics the author's.

No matter, I couldn't read past it. It's really difficult to find (polite and coherent) words in face of this monument to White American entitlement. Any further discussion of this awful bundle of clauses and exploration of the many ways of its wrongness would grossly violate board netiquette.

I'm done with this chapter. There's no possible way the rest of the chapter could redeem pure shit of such amazing density. I'll see if the rest of the book can, but it's an uphill battle from here.

Edit/Add-on: The into fiction. I assumed this always is by the same author, but in case it is not: I found it mediocre. It seemed quite detached from the chapter (or maybe I didn't reach the super orks in space part), but I couldn't really make out what was happening there, and anyway, it wasn't very Ares specific. Besides, why go stabby-stab someone in space? Just damage their module's heat radiation and seal them off for a couple of hours, and they're cooked. Space - it doesn't work like you think it works! But that's a gripe I have with nearly all scifi, so it can hardly be blamed on the author when Heinlein and the Honorverse guy also failed hard at it.

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Mar 14 2016, 12:56 PM

Try read S-K instead. I'm interested what you think of it.

Posted by: hermit Mar 14 2016, 01:21 PM

Trying to do this sequentially. But I will get to SK eventually, promise.

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Mar 14 2016, 01:26 PM

DISCLAIMER: The Introfiction is not written by me and the English might not be perfect, but I hope sufficient for a German writing in English a German character who writes in English.

Posted by: Jaid Mar 14 2016, 04:10 PM

i think the intent of the author was to imply that the reason the guy was drunk was a more interesting story than the fact that the guy was drunk and did things that drunk people sometimes do, even though the consequences of that decision were major.

or, to extend the metaphor into the rest of the chapter, the author is saying the reason ares apparently went all-in on the excalibur is more important than the fact that ares went all-in on the excalibur, even though the consequences of that decision were major.

of course, whether the author actually delivered on that or not is not something i'm equipped to say. i don't have the book, haven't read the rest of the chapter apart from that little section you quoted, and your description of the chapter so far has me a bit doubtful to say the least.

but, as far as i can tell, that's what the author is saying. he's not implying that the drunk rich guy is in any way less accountable for the crash. he's simply stating that there is more to the story, and that the "more to the story" (in the author's opinion at least) is more interesting and important than the part everyone is focusing on.

which could arguably be true if, for example, this was a reflection of ares' ongoing relationship with insect spirits. (not that i've heard any evidence that it has anything to do with the invae, but if it does, well... bug spirits having taken full control of ares would indeed be a bigger story than ares falling to pieces over some stupid gun).

Posted by: hermit Mar 14 2016, 04:40 PM

This is what I got from that point. "Rich guy has the sads. Rich guy gets drunk. Rich guy kills other person due to drunkenness. The really important story: Rich guy has the sads!" While he may be accountable or not, the important fact is a rich guy was sad (dead non-rich people are, of course, not really newsworthy). If you can't see how absurdly, incredibly wrong that is, well, I can't help you then and I shouldn't discuss this here anyway.

But one final note: the "rich guy has the sads" example doesn't work as an analogy for the relationship between Ares and bugs and the absurdity of the Excalibur situation (apparently, the author tries to blame the absurdity of the ad campaign on the bugs, but that doesn't explain the even more aburd reaction of the genral public worldwide - are the also all bug infiltrators?). Something Cold War or maybe John Birch-esque (depending on how far out there the author is) might work there. I don't really see how the rich guy has the sads example does. It just sits there in its awfulness with no real function for the Ares chapter.

Posted by: Nath Mar 14 2016, 10:43 PM

This is a common mantra in journalism. And while I do love writing background stories that delve into the reasons behind events, I think it's probably not the right thing to do when you're writing a Shadowrun sourcebook.

Knowing the reasons for an event may be useful to anticipate what will happen next (that's why it's considered virtuous in journalism). But there's nothing to anticipate in SR because what will happen next does not have to be a logical follow-up. Authors who want to surprise their audience (a lot do) basically have two ways of doing it: unveiling a secret or bringing up an unexpected event. The former require to hide the reasons and motivations of a major player (and possibly even the involvement or the very existence of that player). The latter make the all of those information and any anticipation irrelevant. In both cases, there really are no anticipation to be made. What happens is whatever the line developer and the authors decide. It may be deeply rooted in background, just as it may just follow rules of cool or anything to get rid of a NPC or corporation that particular author dislike.
Thoroughly exploring reasons behind events could be useful for the gamemasters to imagine what could happen next, if the authors were to let plots hanging. Which there are not going to do when it comes to a AAA corporation, or a great dragon, or Seattle,... (heck, lately you can't even toy with some AA any longer without canon interference). Because SR is run by metaplots.

Then, any space devoted to reasons is mostly lost because the GM won't be be able to use for any other purposes. By design, shadowrunners should not be privy to the reasons behind the ongoing events. M. Johnson is not going to tell them why he pay them and they are not going to care (or even be able to learn) about why the opposition will be opposing. You may have players interested in learning about reasons and an adventure designed in a way that allow them to learn about it, and it can be great. An author spending wordcount on reasons without supporting hint with such designed adventure is taking a cheap shot and leaving all the burden to the GM. Which means most of them will never get any use of that background. And the authors or GM who would try to make that wordcount useful face a daunting task because it's extremely hard to write such adventure that do not suck with clumsy, ham-fisted, revelations that break action pace with a long GM monologue.

So I'd say "do not dwell on reasons" is the kind of writing guideline you can ignore only once you have fully understood why it was so important to abide by it before.

Posted by: Jaid Mar 16 2016, 05:06 AM

no, the fact that he is sad is not the interesting the part. *why* he was sad *could* be more interesting.

for example, suppose we set this story of a rich guy getting drunk and crashing a car, say, 4 months before the global financial crisis, and the *reason* he is drunk is that he is an executive at one of the banks and has put the information together to realize what is about to happen. now, i don't care that he's sad about the fact that his company's idiotic decisions are probably going to result in him losing his job (due to the bank going bankrupt), and his rich lifestyle is about to go down the toilet. but the reason for his drinking binge (ie, the fact that the whole word economy is about to get kicked square in the balls) is much bigger news than the rich guy getting drunk and crashing the car.

do i give a rat's ass that the rich guy is sad? no i do not. i really don't care that he was sad. i think it is very unfortunate also that his drunkeness caused the deaths of other people. but in terms of total impact, it is a hell of a lot more significant that he was drunk because the world economy was about to get royally screwed over than it was that his drunkeness caused him to crash a car, however tragic the outcome of him crashing the car. not because his drunkeness or sadness was important, but because the world economy crashing is important to pretty much everyone in the world. perhaps not more important than the car crash to everyone (certainly, i expect the families of those killed in the crash would be more upset about the car crashing than the global economy crashing). but broadly, more significant to far more people.

(in contrast, if the reason for his drunkeness is that he just found out his wife was cheating on him, i'd go right on back to not caring about the reason why he's drunk, and yes the fact that his drunkeness caused the deaths of other people is much more significant than the reason for his drunkeness in that case).

now, this begs the question: did the author actually deliver on the promise? i don't know. i don't have the book. i have no idea whatsoever if the author delivered on the promise that the story behind why ares is crashing and burning is much more relevant than the fact that ares is crashing and burning (which would cause a lot of ripple effects of substantial significance themselves). i could imagine a scenario where that is the case, though not a particularly plausible one... for example, if the bigger story was that competing invae hives had taken over a substantial portion of the world's population and essentially declared war on the hive(s) allied with ares by boycotting ares products (which would presumably include revealing that ares has been allied with invae hives as part of the story also), that would be a much bigger story than the fact that ares is crashing and burning. now, i sincerely hope that isn't the story, because it is a terrible story that just doesn't sound plausible at all. i just give it as an example of something where you would say "who cares that ares is losing money, have you heard about <insert more significant story here>" if you were an NPC in the shadowrun setting.

Posted by: Sengir Mar 16 2016, 12:29 PM

Or maybe, you know, just ignore it. Ares has enough problems with the bugs, why the need to continue the stupid "a triple-A had a bungled product release and nearly went broke because of it" storyline?

Posted by: Betx Mar 16 2016, 04:11 PM

My response to the Ares write up was more or less “Eh, one of those bits of setting that doesn’t make a lot of sense to me – I’ll ignore most of this and come up with my own version.”

I kind of assume that the poor writer was saddled with “Ares made a bad assault rifle, and somehow this has resulted in the entire AAA conglomerate being in trouble.” And just couldn’t make a silk purse out of this particular sow’s ear.

I even imagine a number of emails going back and forth to effect of
“Do I have to use this Ares Alpha thing?”
“Yes.”
“Can I give details on how bugs are disrupting the company?”
“No, we are saving that for something later.”
“Can I at least kill off some executives, have CFD having an impact, major new internal power struggles … basically give anything else concrete on why they are screwing up so badly?”
“No, it has been declared that the only concrete issue is the Ares Alpha. You need to tie all of their problems on that.”
“But that just doesn’t make sense!”
“Do you want this contract or not?”
“I don’t know, could I do NeoNet instead?”
“No, it is this or nothing.”
“OK, fine, I’ll do the section and blame it all on the Alpha. Just don’t be surprised if the boards point out how illogical this is.”
“Don’t worry about the boards – we don’t. And remember, because of your NDA, you can't provide this background either.”

Posted by: Sendaz Mar 16 2016, 04:58 PM

Actually its the bugs who keep bringing up the Excalibur subject so as to divert attention from themselves.

Joe in Sales: You know Johnson down in Accounting? Well he just sprouted some mandibles and wings!! You better look into that!

Security Guard Frank: Nevermind that, did you hear the latest snafu in the Excalibur project?

Joe: No, what?!?

Frank spins a web-like tale of drama and woe, utterly captivating Joe who forgets about Johnson in short order.

Posted by: Sengir Mar 16 2016, 07:41 PM

In all seriousness, that's not a bad thought. People keep getting reassigned to some outpost in the boondocks and are never heard of again? They obviously were responsible for the Excalibur thing. Intra-corporate struggle? Fallout from the Excalibur disaster. The thing you hear about Joe from Sales (or maybe it was in accounting, the grapevine is not sure)? You know that Excalibur has placed significant challenges upon us, and outside agents want to use this opportunity to sow fear and uncertainty among us, the Ares family. Stand strong, loyal citizens, as the proud phalanx of Ares did!

[Yes, I'm fully aware that there was no phalanx of Ares, but I guess Ares gives their namesake a better reputation than actual historical cults ]

Posted by: binarywraith Mar 17 2016, 08:45 AM

It's... progressing. Slowly. Quite playable now, but I don't know where they're at on storyline other than being a bit annoyed that the base game's not done and they're already talking paid content pack.

Posted by: Wakshaani Mar 17 2016, 02:25 PM

Keep the feedback rolling. Always good to see. (Even when painful.)

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Mar 20 2016, 08:32 AM

I could point out some bugs if you like

Posted by: Wakshaani Mar 20 2016, 01:03 PM

You're not disqualified from it y'know. Dig in!

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Mar 20 2016, 02:34 PM

You asked for it

Courting Disaster:
- That AG Chemie got dropped to A-level, even temporary, is bad for several reasons. besides invalidating some German sources, it leaves the question (as the whole AGC stuff happened in German canon before 2074), why AGC was still allowed to be part of the NEEC as a non-extraterritorial corp (the the list in Spy Games, p.93), or what happened to it's seat in the meantime.

Horizon:
- I haven't read all of it, but what I've read was generally ok. I just wondered about the absent of Wind River Corporation (acquired in January 2068, Sixth World Almanac). This is odd, because in the Sioux Nation PDF it is said that "[it's] only a matter of time until they go toe-to-toe with Horizon and Aztechnology on the world food market.", which again is bad, because of... things.

MCT:
- Sikorsky-Bell and Saab are both described as AA's. Unfortunately someone wrote in the CAS chapter in Dirty Tricks, that the CAS don't have any AA's beside Lone Star. As this statement ignores DocWagon, you may say it was bugged in the first place, so you may ignore it. Nonetheless Shadows of Europe clearly states (p. 145), that Saab is not a AA. Thou it would qualify as one, the CC refuses to give it to Saab, because the Scandinavian Union has signed just a modified version of the BRA and want to push them to sign the full treaty.
- Also it is said, that "Sikorsky-Bellalong with their Sikorsky Aircraft and Grumman Aerospace Corporation subsidiaries, [will pull] up to the top of the aircraft production field.". First Grumman is part of Lockheed (Rigger 3, p. 20), and S-B is just a major player in the helicopter market (p.21). As an aerospace company in general they are just #4, after Federated Boeing, Lockheed, Novatech (for whatever reason ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ ) and when I get the introduction on page 20 right Saeder-Krupp and Ares are even before F-B (understandable, just count the aerospace companies in S-K's chapter).
- While not fully a bug, MCT bought "Yakashima Africa". Thou removed from the infobox at the beginning, it is still in the text. From my understanding of economics you can not just buy a whole division (which is not the same as a subsidiary, which are some sort of independent entities). And even if it was "exchanged" is it was in the text, it was a bad trade, as Yakashima gave up his whole division, plus two subsidiaries for CodeBlue Biotech, which is described in Corp Guide (p.117) as a "tiny European biotech company". I think someone got fooled. This is particularly bad, because of ... things.

Renraku:
- A nice bug is, that, while Renraku became a world leading food corporation 'over night' and surpassed Aztech in some areas, it is written, that Renraku bought Nestlé, which - again as written in the text - was a part of Aztech in the first place. Nestlé is actually a Z-IC subsidiary since Shadows of Europe (p.29) out-of-game, and in-game since the late '50s or early '60s (Corp Guide, p. 225). This is bad, because of... possible things.
- It is writen, that Renraku is a shareholder of Hyundai. The author just thought about the automobile company, but this Hyundai Motor Company, is a subsidiary of the Hyundai Motor Group, which again is part of the Hyundai Group umbrella. This, again, is bad, because of... things.

Posted by: Nath Mar 20 2016, 03:06 PM

It's not uncommon for a corporation to spun off its divisions as subsidiaries. Though they may be wholly-owned subsidiaries headquartered at exactly the same address, inside the same building and using the same cafeteria, whose existence only matter to lawyers, accountants and tax services agents.

Anyway, you can buy whatever is for sale. If Yakashima is willing to sell its Yakashima Africa division, it can create such spin-off subsidiary and transfer all related assets just for the purpose of selling them. It's also pretty common to create a shell company to package assets sale (and avod taxes). If they wanted to, they could have created a spin-off subsidiary to sell all their assets whose current number of employees has a 7 in it and sold it to MCT.
But that also means that if Yakashima is not willing to sell, whether its an internal division, a 100%-owned subsidiary or even a 50,00001%-owned subsidiary, there is no way to buy it (except very specific cases where the management has been careless with debt collateral, stock options or simular instruments).

Posted by: Wakshaani Mar 20 2016, 03:30 PM

One of the ongoing problems between teh German team and the US team. A lot of us have *no* *clue* what's going on over there. I've written off ever doing anything S-K related, for instance, as I don't want to step on toes over there. The downgrade probably happened after Spy Games and is part of the current Audit... my guess is that someone on teh Court had a bone to pick with AG, used this to whap them on the nose and cause soem damage, and that the second A will be restored on appeal ... just a way for the big dogs to keep everyone else in line.



That was a huge absence, IMHO. Food is kind of important after all, and Wind River singlehandedly made Horizon the largest agricultural supplier in North America. It's kind of a big deal.



Dirty Tricks was my fault. I fully own that one. (Weirdly, the Atlantis Foundation is also listed as a double-A in other places, and is also based out of Atlanta. It shouldn't be so highly-rated, but, neither here nor there.) ... chalk it up to the chapter narrator having a brainfart.



Renraku's always been a player in the ag game... surprised me when I was doing the reserach too. Back in Corporate Shadowfiles, it was S-K and Yamatetsu (tied at first), MCT, Renraku, and Shiawase (tied at second), and Aztechnology in third (!), above only Ares and Fuchi. in Corporate Download, it was Aztechnology and Shiawase tied at first, then Renraku and Yamatetsu tied at second, with Wuxing and MCT tied at third. Their agricultural strength had just never been well-detailed.
Nestle I'd found as having fallen apart back in 2008 (!) in Corporate Download, but I missed the Shadows of Europe part entirely. We'll have to tie up the Z-IC bit for certain. Drop me a line later for some brainstorming.

And I'll have to dig into the Hyundai Group. I tripped ove rthat with Shonen Jump in Japan, then caught myself and followe dthe trail all the way up to where it belonged, but I missed that for Hyundai. Dangit! Need more webcrawling...

Posted by: hermit Mar 20 2016, 03:51 PM

Now this is interesting, because the German authors have the very same complaints.


The perception among many German fans is that the US authors have a bone to pick with the German team and are retaliating in this way. However, it was stated (in Lockdown, I think) that, in-game, the AGC got the downgrade as part of the Audit and to set an example to all the other uppity 2A corps.


However, Hyundai is a https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/chaebol, a form of company roughly comparable to a Japanese https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keiretsu - a conglomerate of nominally separate companies under a common umbrella name (Hyundai, Mitsubishi, Samsung, Mitsui, Daewoo, Sumitomo) with interlocking stock ownership and controlled by members of an extended family or clan. Chaebol (or keiretsu) stock is rarely traded on stock markets, but due to their nominally independent nature, the separate divisions of a chaebol or keiretsu could evade US occupation dictates that forbade companies of a certain size or above (conversely, Shadowrun's Japanese megacorps are organized as Zeibatsu, which are actually illegal under the current (in-game, abandoned by the Yamato accords) Japanese constitution). If keiretsu were counted as singular entity, and not each member company separately, Sumitomo would be larger than Wal-Mart in every respect save employee numbers. IRL.

The nature of a keiretsu - a conglomerate of independent companies - however does mean that soem fo theae companies, should thier stock be for sale for any reason, may be bought up by another company while keeping their keiretsu name. This is mostly done to forment alliances between different conglomerates - for instance, the Mitsui bank, despite the name, belongs to Sumitomo - or due to the sellout of part of the conglomerate to an outsider party (I believe this happened to parts of Mitsubishi).

In Shadowrun, this means Hyundai Motors may belong to Renraku, while Hyundai-IBM, the core company, belongs to Eastern Tiger, as canon (more specifically, Corporate Shadowfiles) states.

Posted by: Wakshaani Mar 20 2016, 03:59 PM

We really need to make a US-to-Germany channel for discussion. In one of those Things, we'd have to hold it in English, since I don't think anyone on teh US side knows a lick of German. Yes, I know exactly what commentary is now in peoples' heads. Don't get me started on US linguistic programs and expectations. We'll be here for a *while*.

Posted by: hermit Mar 20 2016, 04:13 PM

Yes, that seems really, urgently necessary. Most German authors know English at least well enough to communicate, I think.

And don't sweat it. It's just unrealistic to expect anyone to learn German for what's a side job at best, I'm seeing myself just how hard that seems to be working with refugees and American friends who consider emigrating next year way more seriously than I would have expected.

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Mar 20 2016, 04:26 PM

Divisions, subsidiaries, sells:
Well, yes, I know that, but besides that all, I don't see any involving party is whiling to sell, either their share or whole parts of their company to either MCT or Renraku, either because of enmity (the Japanese and Koreans aren't the closest friends on this planet), or for pure economic reason, especially when you just get a tiny European company in exchange.

Could you give me the page number for that? I always searched for the exact reference of Hyundai-IBM... but as I already hinted when I refereed to things, I meant the AA-chapter by me and Michel Witch, which included Yakashima and ETC (where I mentioned Hyundai Group as the second biggest Korean corporation (AA). Hyundai Group, because I couldn't find anything on Hyundai-IBM besides the name, and I guess that this is either just a joint venture or a subsidiary).


There should be a forum post by Michel about that. I'm in completely favor of that, but there have some other things to be done. May find me on Facebook, where we could discuss this.

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Mar 20 2016, 04:43 PM

There should cycle at least two, maybe even three or four corporate index Excel fills around. Some can be found, when you use google, two or three should be somewhere around all the freelancers, already. James Meiers started one, based on the oldest version. Then there seems to be a "2065" version (which also includes the bugs and errors of the original and Meier's version) and I also send around my version (most up-to-date one, with errors corrected and German sources included).

Personally, I wouldn't use Corporate Shadowfiles as source material, unless it's the only one, as it's very old, and mostly out-of-date. Also several things got retconed.

As for Z-IC, it is an old corp, (ingame), thou introduced in the London sourcebook, it was first greatly used in the 3rd edition, while Nestlé was included in a German sourcebook about Switzerland, but was named Nestor (and Nestlé was a subsidiary). With Shadows of Europe the retconed it to be Nestlé again.

For the Renraku situation, I would either use Mondolez or Coca Cola instead.

Posted by: hermit Mar 20 2016, 05:07 PM

I'll check, but it'll require using print books, therefore may take some time. My gut says corporate Download and corporate Shadowfiles, but I'll also check Shadows of Asia.

Edit: Nothing on Hyundai-IBM in SoA.


Would you terribly mind giving it to me? For my lists.

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Mar 20 2016, 05:32 PM

The Corporate index just lists Native American Nations 1 as a source for Hyundai-IBM, without a page number. IBM again is mentioned in Neo-Anarchist Guide to North America, while Hyundai Motors emerged first in Rigger 3. In SoA the just talk about Hyundai, so besides guessing the authors just wrinting about the motor company, I interpreted it in that way, that the Shadowtalkers actually talk about the Hyundai Group.


Sorry, but no. Beside it contain some internal stuff it is also still work in progress. But as I said, you can try your luck with Google, but that versions are not error free.

Posted by: hermit Mar 20 2016, 05:51 PM

NAN one, huh. Hyundai as a motor company goes back as far as Shadowplay (the novel), which lists the Hyundai docks where the company keeps many, many import cars for sale in the Northwest.

Nothing I found in Corp shadowfiles, but damn it, why isn't there a searchable PDf of that book. :/

Posted by: Nath Mar 20 2016, 08:21 PM

Those were the good old days when authors were creating megacorporations by taking the name of an American company and the name of an Asian company and putting them together.

Such entry in the Corporate Index that lacks page number either come from the word document Rob Boyle distributed to freelancers that I used as a starting point for the index, or from books I only had a French version available at the time (with different page numbers that wouldn't be relevant to other people). Considering I never managed to keep the things wholly up to date, I also never took the time to make a second pass to complete the missing data.

I made the mistake not to put a version number in it. However, I only put new a version online when at least one book would have been added in full (which allow to use the booklist for versioning).
The "2065 version" was supposed to some sort of an ultimate version once it became obvious I would never find the time to catch up on 4th edition sourcebooks. It stopped with System Failure and third edition in 2065. I don't see how it could include bugs and errors "of the Meier's version" since it would predate his making of one (which I never saw personally). Unless he was the secret source from which Rob Boyle held the original file.

I'd be interested to know about bugs and errors. Note the index lists what is actually written in the book, even if it makes little sense, unless there was an obvious contradiction to address. HQ mentions was sometimes based on Real Life corporation. All of this, of course, cannot account for books who were published after the index was made.

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Mar 20 2016, 09:17 PM

I meant it that way, that Meier stated his version (AFAIK) on the original one and so took over the bugs, besides there was a newer version (which again had the same bugs).


Some little tweaks here and there, correcting page numbers or corporate status (like the one of Saab, mentioned above), added some missing corporations, removed some that weren't coronations (like "Schreiber, Kimoto, Pünder & Partner Rechtsanwalts- und Steuerberater-GmbH", were you made a subsidiary out of every name ), removed some doubles, corrected some sources, page numbers, etc.

Posted by: binarywraith Mar 22 2016, 07:57 AM

I am actually appalled that you (the greater 'you' as in 'the writing team') don't already have this in a day and age where it takes ten seconds to email someone, and real-time video/voice/text chat is ubiquitous.

Posted by: Wakshaani Mar 22 2016, 12:32 PM

They do upstairs, so that the leads can stay in contact and handle big stuff. The Freelancers are just typewriters for hire. That kind of thing is technically above our pay grade. Having access to financials ia *useful* for Engineering, so that you can know what level of pricing your design can handle, but as long as the guys upstairs give you a target, you don't really need to know. Same thing here: We don't *have* to know this, but it'd be handy.

Posted by: Blade Mar 22 2016, 01:05 PM

But Engineering in one site needs to be able to communicate with Engineering from the other site.

Posted by: Sengir Mar 22 2016, 01:52 PM

Germans are in the same boat as the Japanese: We are fully aware that our language is useless on an international level, hence speaking at least some English is practically mandatory

I still wouldn't suggest real-time communications, though. Finding a common time slot across 9 hours of time difference just doesn't work well, trust me.

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Mar 22 2016, 02:21 PM

Language should not be a barrier, as all authors should be able to write and talk at a decent level of english. The problem is to find a suitable platform. And to accomplish that, someone has to do things. But that's to much for a a public discussion.

Posted by: Wakshaani Mar 22 2016, 03:46 PM

Indeed. About to go to teh day job, but I'll follow up thsi conversation via channels soon.

Posted by: Sengir Mar 22 2016, 05:10 PM

See, I just went home. So when you're on a conference in Vegas, the people in Berlin who filed the ticket will have long gone home by the time their issue gets handed through to level 3...

Posted by: Betx Mar 22 2016, 10:30 PM

If our supplier project lead, in Bucharest, can conference us (eastern north america) and their head office (California) and manufacturing monitoring office (Taiwan), I'm sure you could all figure it out

But realistically, email, or better yet a mailing list or private forum, would probably be easier the vast majority of the time. But once in a while a few minutes of conversation can avoid days of writing!

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Mar 22 2016, 11:24 PM

I skyped with Michael Witch (Albuquerque?), Scott Schletz and Jason Hardy and i live in Hamburg, Germany. But as oyu said there are plenty of possibilities to communicate.

Posted by: binarywraith Mar 23 2016, 04:21 AM

I suppose at the very least it's the kind of thing the guys responsible for the editing passes before publication should probably twig to, rather than waiting for the fanbase to point it out every time.

Posted by: Sengir Mar 23 2016, 08:15 PM

I raise to California, Central Europe. and Japan, that's an extra hour spread

It's all a question of the right tool for the right task, sometimes scheduling a call with Toyko is less burdensome than another 200 mails.


To get this a least partially back on topic, how is Ares' bug problem?

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Mar 26 2016, 10:09 AM

Dunno, when we left of, hermit wanted to skip Ares and go on to Aztech.

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Mar 29 2016, 09:30 AM

Anyway, I would appreciate any review or correction of my Saeder-Krupp chapter.

Posted by: hermit Apr 5 2016, 02:18 PM

In fact, hermit lied and read through Ares anyway. This running review is brought to you by Havana Club International, S.A.

The Ares chapter gets better, but not much.

I'll start with something nice. On page 48, we get a box of corp-specific lingo. While it is supposed to be military slang but doesn't nearly contain enough acronyms (and bad language hidden behind them) like actual military slang, feeling kinda bowdlerized, I have wanted to see something like this for quite some time now - to breathe some life into the sociolect idea Shadowrun never went anywhere with. I'd really have liked to see this for all megas.

Also, if the authors really want to merge Ares and Horizon, well, why not. It's about time someone consolidated the American corps a bit and got SR a little less American-focused. Maybe give a second chinese company a shot, one that owns a bit of the Coastal Provinces perhaps? There are https://img.washingtonpost.com/wp-apps/imrs.php?src=https://img.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/files/2013/05/population-map-1024x626.jpg&w=1484 in Shadowrun, too. How about current 3A megacorps? (hint: 4/10)

Now, for the bad stuff. Apparently, it's actually bugs are behind the Excalibur debacle (what) because one in 10 Ares employees is a bug (what?!), and this made the public go wild about their GMCs and iComs and American Airlines flight tickets (WHAT?! Because one in 10 of their customers also are bugs?!). Really, the author's dedication to sticking with a bad idea is almost commendable. I hear Cunard is looking for Violinists. That may be his kind of job! Whether it's Ares or the general public is "depending on which crackpot conspiracy theorist" we believe (because that's where the real real news are - with truthers conspiracy theorists. I'll refrain from further exploration of this).

Actually, someone just http://&lt;a%20href=&quot;http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-02-08/russian-hackers-moved-currency-rate-with-malware-group-ib-says&quot;%20target=&quot;_blank&quot;&gt;http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/201...e-group-ib-says&lt;/a&gt;. And why "can't pull it alone" signifies "great dragons", the author never explains. This is an arbitrary example of a massive problem that permeates the entire article: causality between random things is just claimed, and then sentences that read like proof or facts in support are added that are just more random claims, really. The moon is made of cheese because bananas, and Damien Knight is in league with great dragons (plural!) because nobody could have done the Nanosecond buyout alone. Nevermind that he probably could, with the aid of a more advanced version of Corkow (maybe with a more evil name, like CzernoBog?), but hey, not everyone can follow IT security insiders when there're so many crackpot truthers conspiracy theorists to choose your truth from.

But it seems to me the author has no idea how the method of proof by facts works, or just can't be bothered. And the in-world voice - Cosmo is supposed to be a "cynical corp raider/disillusioned anarchist who works as a Johnson and a fixer" - goes on a tangent about HMHVV, Bugs or CFD with literally everybody. The entire article reads like one of those bizarre, self-published books about UFO bioroid sex bot Men in Black written by someone whose mental issues are so painfully obvious it hurts to read.

That is not how you should write a text that contains worthwhile information, even in and about a fictional world.

Ah crap, bottle's empty. Next review tomorrow soon whenever.

Posted by: hermit Apr 5 2016, 11:38 PM

The hermit returns, wooohoo! And only slightly drunk! This running review is brought to you by Havana Club International, S.A.

Now, for Aztechnology. It seems Cosmo has been cured of his (her?) momentary madness during the Ares chapter and is more or less back to cynical corporate raider Johnson.

There are some issues here, initially. Issues that probably are not only the author's fault. The chief issue is: What became of Médicarro? ChromeFlesh was all about how Aztech launched a DocWagon-like service called QuetzalCare. Now, Aztlan has had a joint-venture DocWagon-like service (with DocWagon) ever since the Aztlan book. Has this cooperation been severed and MédiCarro's assets been consolidated into QuetzalCare? That was my assumption. Then why is Médicarro listed as one of Aztechnology's chief divisions? Why does MédiCarro get a long-ish writeup in Aztech North America? I assume the author drew mostly on the Corp Dossier book and little to no coordination happened between them and the ChromeFlesh author responsible for the relevant bits of ChromeFlesh, but ... well, could an author say something about this? Is QuetzalCare MédiCarro's street-level new name, or is it a different services provider under the same corporate umbrella?

The first paragraphs are nicely written. Also, nice pokes towards Silicon Valley culture. Some typos (Dasault [sic]) but not many. And Cosmo doesn't remind me of self-published rants of people who need professional help.

The chapter offers a lot of value to flesh out a campaign, from the Shack's P2.1 account and the things it tweets (shouldn't that be 'beep'?), like the 2 am Burrito Koan, they offer examples of how Aztechnology PR works as opposed to Horizons, and they make the notion that Aztechnology, the designated evil corporation, is actually pretty popular. And why do they love the big A? A combination of a good media strategy and diversifying their spider's web of subsidiaries' media strategies, rather than banking on their central brand, solid PR damage control, and making good quality products. Hey, that explanation works!

The history part seems accurate for the most part (I really should reread the Aztechnology book), the focus on VITAS is nice, since VITAS is a pitoval, cataclysmic event in the Shadowrun timeline that usually is just totally neglected, and gives a good, concise, rundown of how David, Medellin and Massaya, three Mesoamerican drug gangs, became a Megacorp. The events of stormfront are surprisingly well handled, all things considered, and the Fanboy Much? Corps is not mentioned even once (+1).

The people section is where the first major mistake is to be found, though: So Dzitbalchén is the dragon owning Motecuhzoma, head of Aztech magic R&D? Really? After having been executed for murder by Aztlan/Aztech and dissected, the recording of which was a hit simsense in 2073? really? Again, a fluff bible seems desperately in order. Still, it updates well on other board members (J.J. Harvn jr!), and offers Aztech's very own version of Hans Brackhaus, which is actually really nice and again a detail helpful for GMs to flesh out their games. However, on the topic of J.J. Harvin, will we ever learn what became of Gunderson's deep-sea arcology, the one with the highly addictive and toxic undersea tobacco?

The chapter rounds out with information on what running for and Aztech is like. Ares did that too, but it's done better here, I feel, instead of "they really like the military, like, a lot, so you gotta balance between pleasing Sgt. Johnson and how you like to do jobs", you get how Aztech jobs tend to naturally be dirtier than other corps' jobs, and how running against the big A is like a box of chocolates.

All in all, nice chapter with a few flaws, the biggest being part of a larger problem the author is probably not him/herself to blame.

Hey, that was only one Mojito, and that mainly because this Moroccan spearmint is so damn good!

Posted by: binarywraith Apr 6 2016, 08:17 AM

Jebus Fraggin' Crabst.

Did they even do the math on how may fragging bug spirits that is? All this with nary a one being caught out, with Bug City a thing that happened and was highly publicized?

This approaches 'Sailing Out Of Bogota' on the 'Did they even say this out loud to see if it sounded plausible' scale.

Posted by: hermit Apr 6 2016, 08:39 AM

Yes, though the chapter is such an incoherent rant, it's hard to take it serious (and I suppose Cosmo's a headcase).

From the Evo chapter:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wnec6SmjHP0 Seriously, lay off Plan 9 for once and look at the Ares chapter! As a quick fix, you could just re-attribute the chapter to Plan 9 as an in-game author, actually. That'd explain a LOT.

In better news, the following chapters are much more fun to read and offer a lot more useful material.

Posted by: Blade Apr 6 2016, 09:44 AM

Thanks for your reviews, very informative and well written.

Posted by: Sendaz Apr 6 2016, 10:41 AM

On the plus side, rumour has it 6th edition will have Bug as a Player Option when you get an Ares Corp SIN.

Posted by: Renard Apr 6 2016, 10:44 AM

Screw bugs !
Those monsters from Harlequin's back are the rage now among th cool kids or so I heard !

Posted by: Sengir Apr 6 2016, 08:53 PM

So the Ares bug thing is public knowledge now?

Posted by: hermit Apr 6 2016, 09:04 PM

Depending on which crackpot you ask?

Posted by: Sengir Apr 6 2016, 09:28 PM

Crackpot rumors about bug invasion hurting Ares sounds believable, but how does the Excalibur project factor in, then?

Posted by: hermit Apr 7 2016, 12:16 AM

By the power of "rampant acceptance of coincidentally connected evidence".

Posted by: Sendaz Apr 7 2016, 07:44 AM

if you go with a bit of Plan 9 thinking, you could see it as the bugs trying to integrate into their various departments with only a partial understanding of what they are doing.

Kind of like the 1989 movie 'The Experts' where the Russians have created a town simulating America so as to better train their spies, but in their case they realize they are a bit out of touch basically living like the 50's and bring in Travolta & Arye Gross characters as 'experts' to bring them up to date.

In our situation, the bugs are operating on half gained knowledge from their merging while not necessarily getting the full life experience to integrate it all.
So they are making a lot of rookie level mistakes and probably are just as confused by the results as we are.

Hmmm..... a run where the bugs hire the Runners to kidnap them some experts of their own to show them what they need to be doing....

Posted by: lokii Apr 7 2016, 07:46 AM

Isn't it more or less common knowledge that Dunkelzahn bankrolled the Nanosecond Buyout after dropping this unsubtle hint in his will?

But drunken reviews, referring to yourself in the third person? Market Panic gets to you, man.

Posted by: hermit Apr 7 2016, 09:45 AM

Sure, that's mythos knowledge (he only ever was one great dragon, not more, which is why I signified the plural). I doubt it's common enough knowledge, especially when the CFD AI who used Cosmo's body to write it doesn't seem to know it was Dunkelzahn. But it was only an arbitrary example of the kind of broken reasoning the author used all the time, anyway.


More like the Ares chapter. The rest (I'm through Evo and into Horizon now) seems actually pretty good. It's quite the roller coaster ride.


The greatest problem I have with the Ares storyline is the reaction from customers. Bonkers business decisions, like a super expensive advertisement campaign for a product that is illegal virtually everywhere aside, and that product being utter crap aside, why would that make someone spontaneously torch their car, stomp their commlink and quit their bank account? It's Ares Arms gone mad, maybe, but why distrust an entire incredibly wide spread company, over a product most of their customers couldn't care less about? Or did you burn your lawn mower over the G36 debacle (let's leave the viability of the G36 aside)?

Posted by: Sendaz Apr 7 2016, 12:06 PM

Yeah, the consumer reaction was pretty weird.

*pushes the remains of his still smouldering lawn mower under the car*
Ummm.. maybe?

Posted by: lokii Apr 7 2016, 01:42 PM

It was also discussed openly in Corporate Download. But maybe the info was eaten by Jormungand.

Posted by: hermit Apr 7 2016, 03:31 PM

Or Dev//grrl's teacher confiscated that comment.

Posted by: binarywraith Apr 8 2016, 02:55 AM

Or the writer, as distressingly usual, just doensn't know the fluff.

Posted by: hermit Apr 11 2016, 12:07 PM

I've been thinking about the Ares chapter, and I might have misjudged the author. All this rests on one premise: The chapter was intended as Plan 9's POV.

If that was the intent, well executed - the chapter captures the rambling, incoherent, at the same time paranoid (don't trust the news!) and obedient (ufologists say it was aliens, what else could it be?!) madness of conspiracy nuts far better than the actual Plan 9 narrative in the Evo chapter. And, in that case, sorry for the overly harsh review. Maybe take it as that your writeup is a bit too good and works too well.

Of course, then that would beg the questuion why this obviously Plan 9 POV writeup wasn't assigned to Plan 9, but to Cosmo, and why there never was a "the real deal on Ares" add-on because one cannot trust "Plan 9's (...) rampant acceptance of coincidentally connected evidence"- and why this was done to the surprisingly sane Evo chapter. Miscommunication?

Posted by: Blade Apr 11 2016, 12:45 PM

Even if that's the case, it would have been nice to have a GM section to clear up the mess, so that GMs could avoid disconnecting their games from the official timeline by using one element that's later revealed to be bogus.
But that's a problem that Shadowrun almost always had.

Posted by: hermit Apr 11 2016, 01:32 PM

Indeed, especially since the Evo chapter has an in-world disclaimer about the real deal on Evo. Which led me to believe that which chapter is supposed to be Plan 9's voice might have been miscommunicated.

Posted by: Jaid Apr 11 2016, 05:28 PM

well you have to admit that ares being 10% bug spirits, and more importantly their customer base being 10% bug spirits, is bigger news than ares having financial struggles (not so much ares being 10% bug spirits, although that's pretty scary, as 10% of their customer base being bug spirits.... which would imply an awful lot of bug spirits active in the world, in hiding).

unfortunately, from my end at least, it sounds pretty dumb. as others have already mentioned, that is an awful lot of bug spirits for nobody to notice. considering how big the megas are, 10% of the customers of one mega being bug spirits probably means a percentage of the world population that is uncomfortably close to 10% being bug spirits. that would have to be one heck of a cover-up operation.

Posted by: hermit Apr 11 2016, 06:58 PM

It's Lizardman Putin nuts, that's what it is. But if this was supposed to be an utterly nuts and nonsensical writeup by Plan 9, it reads pretty authentic.

Posted by: Sendaz Apr 11 2016, 07:09 PM

Coming this Summer....

An Arachne Entertainment Production......

Featuring the most controversial action hero to date....

Xenia, Mantis Princess

Posted by: Wakshaani Apr 11 2016, 08:28 PM

Moving past Ares, I'm waiting to see what else Hermit has to say.

(And other people! Y'all can all post about chapters, y'know.)

Posted by: hermit Apr 11 2016, 11:28 PM

Well, what I have to say about about Aztechnology is to be found http://forums.dumpshock.com/index.php?s=&showtopic=41479&view=findpost&p=1320007.

Posted by: Ixal Apr 11 2016, 11:30 PM

Where does the 10% come from? I have only seen the entry that crackpot conspiracy theorists talk about 20-80 % bugs in Ares, but it is made clear that those are not serious numbers and all that is known is that there is bug influence in Ares but the extend is entirely unknown.

Btw, considering how Volkswagen is grilled over the emission values I don't think an excalibur fiasko is that far off.


Is it just me or do the guys of Catalyst have a beef with germans?
I know I shouldn't complain too mucn as S-K gets a full entry in Market Panic instead of only a fraction of content compared to other corps (Data Trails). Not that Catalyst had a choice in that matter as it is a 100% corp book.

What really annoys me is that the writter can't think of any way to give S-K a own culture instead of having nazi analogies.
Granted, again, Market Panic is rather good in that regard with its Roman like country building but they could't help themselves to have S-K now use nazi terminology (Fall Magenta). Data Trails was much worse in that regard.
Still, can't they think of anything better than "German = Nazi"?

I do quite like that S-K is not the largest MC any more and is desperate to get back on top. That gives them at least some profile after it was ignored so much in previous products.
And while I dislike the use of the terminology, the color Magenta was a rather good choice, assuming that it really is a plan agains NeoNet.

When I talk about S-K I can also review this chapter, but it won't be as good as hermits reviews.
As said, S-K is not the largest Mega out there any more. CFD shutting down nanofabricators hit them hard and the Dragon Civil War distracted Lofwyr from running the corp which lead to attacks by other corps now that the giant showed a weakness and also defections in the middle east.
S-Ks tiered structure is explained and also that Lofwyr is not shaping S-K as a normal corp but more as a country (Roman Style) with him on top. If that is deliberate or because of Lofwyr being stuck in old ways is left out (but it is hinted that it is the latter).

What the civil war showed is that without Lofwyr S-K is thrown into chaos as no one has a clue how to run this thing. Thus Lofwyr created a Consensus Lite which shows possible courses of actions to take while he is away.
In Germany S-K buikds a huge Arcology "Neu-Essen" (aka Lofwyr town) as his seat of power but also faces opposition from other Megas now increasing their efforts in Europe while S-K is weakened and also because a Beloit was elected chancellor. And she is smart in her fight against S-K by not going at them directly.
To get back on its feet, Lofwyr has aligned himelf with NeoNet, but is apparently ready to pounce on them and swallow as much as he can from them once they stumble (more). Thats the mentioned Fall Magenta.

Posted by: Zednark Apr 12 2016, 12:29 AM

I think part of the reason S-K gets smaller write ups is because S-K is kinda viewed as the German team's turf. I could be wrong, though.

Posted by: hermit Apr 12 2016, 02:31 AM

Doesn't affect their sales in China (or Europe) much. US always was alosing market for them anyway. VW's problems come mostly from the US 'justice' system, but I can't honestly say that comes undeserved. Still, it's unlikely that would make Americans (or anyone) decide not to buy any product associated with Germany aymore, which is how far-reaching the Ares situation is made out to be. If anything, this proves the scenario is far off. And remember, we're talking cars here - something a majority of people in developed countries own and, usually, are fairly invested in. The Excalibur situation was about something that is illegal to own everywhere.


Not with Krupp, who were set up for a fall for at least 10 books now (a plotline driven by German writers, at least in part). The AG Chemie downgrade, though. Given the display of idiocy and pettiness in the last S5 Mission, though, that's not especially Germans-focused as more general unprofessional and petty behavior.


The Krupp chapter was writte by a German author (Sascha Morlock). I mean, the Magenta kinda is a dead giveaway (though Deutsche Telecom actually became Hermes Eurocom, which currently is known as Aethernet). And besides, German Shadowrun has a long history of really crude Nazi terminology jammed into corporate language and projects, and it's not all due to that one Perry Rhodan author in the 90s (ever noticed the two notable German PMC both acronm SS?). Or what about AG Chemie? Stöckter? The metahuman concentration camps? Wehrhotel adolf Hitler from the original Germany SB? None of that was written up by an American author.

Ubernet was dumb, of course, but at least it wasn't a concentration camp dungeon crawl again.

Posted by: Wakshaani Apr 12 2016, 02:43 AM

(Didn't we just cover this?) ... For teh record, there's no bad blood form teh US side. More that there's a quiet group concensus that we should leave S-K for the Germans to play with.

And there's absolutely no intention that I'm aware of to cast S-K as nazis in any way, shape, form, or fashion.

(Nazis are dicks.)

Posted by: Ixal Apr 12 2016, 03:15 AM

Well there are direct nazi references in Data Trails, that strange "Why is it always the Germans" comment in Chrome&Steel and now the usage of nazi military terms in Market Trails. And the focus on S-Ks youth program can also be seen as a reference to the Hitlerjugend but that is a bit far fetched.

But enough about the past, as I said Market Panic is rather good in the way SK is described than previous products.
SK gets a distinct style apart from Dragon Corp and Hans Brackhaus and also shows some chinks in its armor which imo makes the corp more interesting than the monolithic and invulnerable entity it was in the past.

I am not well versed in SR5 lore so I cant comment on any big revelations or inconsistencies. Someone else has to look for them.
Although it would really surprise me if a politician, no matter who, can more than slightly inconvenience SK in its core territory, at least not without some serious foreshadowing.

Now if there only were some more SK consumer products to remind players that the corp exists apart from being employer or target.
But I havent read Rigger 5 yet. Vehicles seem to be the most likely case for that.

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Apr 12 2016, 05:46 AM

Well, indeed I took 'Fall Magenta' from German military operation odes pre-WW2 (which are named Fall Gelb, Fall Grün, Fall Weiß, etc.), but just for the purpose to for a "German" naming pattern for greater operations. You are free to not like it, but in my view it's not as stu.... far of as when BMW would name one of their vehicles 'Blitzkrieg' (especially when you see how the Police often name their special units for certain cases).

The youth program (S-K Globetrotters) is - as many other parts of the chapter - direct translations of German canon. This one comes from the Rhein-Rhur-Megaplex. And why you can see them as a copy of the HJ, for me they reflect more somehting like the Boy Scouts, or - if you want a political organisation - the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_German_Youth of the GDR. So, it is nothing I came up with. In the end it is something Lofwyr use to further integrate corporate ideology into his people, as there are - when you include the BMW history - round about 3 generations of corporate citizens now working for that mega.

S-K in most cases don't have to hire new people, it can use his own citizens to recruit them for free jobs. By hiring new people, they have to indoctrinate them real fast, while born corporate citizens you can form right from the beginning. Nonetheless, you don't have to join any activities by the Globetrotters, or any other parts of the youth programm, as just some sentences later, in that same subchapter, it is explained that S-K even tolerates, when you become a "rebel". And Some further sentences later, it is said that S-K is - after Horizon - the most tolerant corporation, which don't discriminate any of its employees. The S-K swagger/classism is something from Corp Guide, which I think fits to a corp (and fits to cyberpunk), that was number 1 for over a Generation (thou I ease it a bit by saying it is a common theme found in nearly all corporations to some extend).

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Apr 12 2016, 05:55 AM

And Neu-Essen isn't a 90 km² arcology, but rather a city within a city, that has one arcology (the S-K Main Arcology) within its borders.

Posted by: Ixal Apr 12 2016, 06:50 AM

As I said even I saw the connection between the globetrotters to the HJ as far fetched, but given the previous track record I didnt rule it out. And I liked the S-K Swagger.
As long future content stays at the level of Market Panic all is fine. Just dont do another Data Trails.


For something completely different, I am not sure if I like the speed Shiawase went from rising star (Stormfront & Core book) to the mess it is now. Still, conflict is good. That keeps things interesting and offers more hooks for runs.

PS: Now I want a Lofwyr plush.

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Apr 12 2016, 06:57 AM

Data Trails wasn't me, and I just wrote S-K in Market Panic, because the original author stepped down. MP was for me the first writing for CGL.

Posted by: Sendaz Apr 12 2016, 07:02 AM

And it must come loaded with http://www.neomonsterisland.com/tktarkv/vol1/001/001/lemonsours.htm.

Posted by: Ixal Apr 12 2016, 08:07 AM

Well then, welcome to hell.

I will leave your finaly judgment to hermit.

Posted by: Sengir Apr 12 2016, 06:48 PM

VW was caught cheating with their pants down. Ares merely released a sub-par product, manufacturers do that all the time. And Ares is supposed to be several orders of magnitude larger and more diversified than VW, what is a huge dent in profits for a car manufacturer should remain somewhere in the decimals for an AAA.


But predator-prey dynamics say the cover-up wouldn't have to last all that long


As for "Fall Magenta", sounds like an episode from Obersalzberg (think The Office with Hitler as Brent)...Herr Hitler trying to get through customer support

Posted by: hermit Apr 15 2016, 01:12 PM

Stuff continues.

This running review, for now, is nonalcoholic, mainly due to it being migraine week. Migraine week has nothing to do with the review's content.

The Evo chapter is narrated by Plan 9. However, it sounds far less ramblingly insane than the Ares chapter. THIS IS NOT RIGHT (no offense to the Evo author, but it had to be said).

The intro fiction is nice, illustrating the menagerie of Strange Evo has (at least in parts) become since it started out as Yamatetsu in 52.

The chapter jumps straight into the history section, which is awfully short (and omits Yamatetsu's Corp Court history), but not wrong.

From there, it jumps to the first of three major plot points: Evo's CEO, former cosmonaut Anatoly Kirilenko, is dead, and the corporation is looking for a replacement. Evo being the intergalactic freak show it is, the candidates are ... colorful. There's a free spirit of storm called Strato Cumulus (Buttercup's choice), Taylor Dacopral (an AI, backed by traditionalist Japanese remnants), Cynthia Bills (a Monad, sure to gain public confidence after the public already shuns Evo for their deep involvement with the nanopocalypse), Abhi Khala, an Indian MMA champion (the shareholders' favourite) and Ysil (a Naga; opposition to whom incited violence against naga all around the world, apparently).

The second major plot point is that Evo will do a 180 on their brand policy back to Yamatetsu's original policy of invisibility, to try and mitigate the damage their involvement in the nanopocalypse causes and is going to cause. How having a CEO that reminds everyone of this involvement will help is beyond me, but maybe this is a compromise position between whatever forces within Evo are pushing for a Monad or AI CEO and the business parts of the mega trying to still get some business done and not becoming a hot potato.

The third is, of course, Monad infiltration of/involvement in Evo, the Evo far-space travel ship building (the Monad Ark?), and the fallout. It is mostly written by Slamm-0, which makes for a less pro-Evo point of view (though seriously, just make the first part of the chapter not Plan 9 and stick his name onto the Ares chapter - isn't line developing according to Hardy all about turning lemons into lemonade?). Also, who is Sekretar? Slamm-0 finishes with Evo's expansion into Yakut.

There is a weird little OOC box, though, about Evo Products. It suggests making Evo products better than normal products by GM discretion (talk about a can of worms). Now, I really like the idea of various producers giving certain perks to otherwise generic products - for instance, Spinrad-brand cybernetics getting the additional wireless bonus of enhanced social limit, MCT-brand electronics having a +1 firewall, or Aztech-brand medkits healing a bonus box of damage - give some life to corporate branding! However, a number of examples given are odd, from stuff that already is in ChromeFlesh (False Front bioware, Gammaware) to world-breaking ("Psychokinetic abilities that allow technomancers or mundanes mental powers to move objects"). Still, all in all, a decent if not great chapter full of story arc and plot ideas. Solidly executed.

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Apr 29 2016, 09:29 AM

BTW, here is a picture of Neu-Essen
https://sirdoomsbadcompany.files.wordpress.com/2011/09/s-k-arkologie-essen-rrp-shadowrun-4.jpg

Posted by: hermit Apr 29 2016, 01:16 PM

New review incoming, now that I have a lot less crap on my to-do.

Posted by: Wakshaani Apr 29 2016, 03:42 PM

That ... is a grey, grey city.

Yikes.

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Apr 29 2016, 03:50 PM

... and still probably the best place to live within the Rhine-Ruhr-Megaplex

Posted by: Ixal Apr 29 2016, 04:08 PM

Isn't there a big park somewhere in it (see the Dryad employee entry for SK)?

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Apr 29 2016, 04:21 PM

Size is relative

But yeah there should be parks and some "city forrests" around. You cen see some of it in the left corner.

Posted by: hermit Apr 29 2016, 05:16 PM

Indoor park, I presume. The old Krupp family mansion is in it, too, IIRC.

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Apr 29 2016, 11:11 PM

While the picture is just there to give you en impression, it may not show the the whole picture (and it's also from a time where Neu-Essen is under heavy construction). So besides huge residental ares, there are also some smaller green spaces here and there, as well as a possible indoor park within the arcology.

Posted by: lokii Apr 30 2016, 08:30 AM

By the way, this image (or rather a section of it) is available as a free poster from DriveThruRPG: http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/97967/

Posted by: Blade May 2 2016, 09:24 AM

Not so different from Alt-Essen then

Posted by: Wakshaani May 9 2016, 11:56 PM

Just a reminder that we're still happy to have people review this one. Market Panic dropped sooner than I thought which threw everyone off by a bit.

But we haven't forgotten the Megas! They're kinda big, after all.

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Jun 7 2016, 05:47 PM

Admit your own mistakes:
Thou a minor one I falsely wrote in page 165 that Ætherlink owned a 9% share of DeMeKo: It's actually a 8% share. Also it's said that Scale is Lofwyr's "executioner", while in my text file he was just his "executor" - thou this may sometimes include to execute someone.

Posted by: Sendaz Jun 7 2016, 05:54 PM

I always thought Lowffie 'fired' people directly, preferably to well done.

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Jun 7 2016, 06:00 PM

Posted by: Wakshaani Jun 7 2016, 07:25 PM

I still need to go through my chapter, find the parts that can't be re-used, and give y'all a "Director's Cut" of the 10,000 words I went over when I misread my contract.

Posted by: Betx Jun 8 2016, 12:24 AM

I hope you get time to do this

Posted by: Wakshaani Jun 8 2016, 02:57 AM

Yeah, a few parts were more timing (Like the chapter conclusion), one part was to showcase an element of sexism, some plot hooks, some details about operations ... nothing, you know, utterly *vital*, but nice for color.

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Jun 8 2016, 11:51 AM

Don't know what your chapters are, but there might also be a mismatching story about the space lift.

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Jun 9 2016, 08:55 AM

Jup, MCT chapter sais S-K completed the space elevator (p. 114 and 117), while S-K chapter talks about S-K beeing behind schedule because of the trouble the corporation had (p. 166).

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Aug 16 2016, 05:17 PM

@ Wakshaani

As I got the impression you wrote Renraku, what is LGSK Electronic Holdings?

Posted by: Wakshaani Aug 18 2016, 03:39 PM

I did, yeah. Drop me an Email and I'll sling some detail your way.

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Aug 18 2016, 05:34 PM

AFAIK I dont have your address.

Posted by: Wakshaani Aug 21 2016, 02:21 PM

I thought you did! Went to check my inbox, and nope. Well, time to fix that, eh?

Posted by: hermit Oct 12 2016, 11:18 PM

Sorry for the absence. I stopped for personal, non-SR reasons, will pick up again now. This running review is sober for now.

I’ll drop my review schedule (by chapter as in the book) for this one, and will review Saeder-Krupp now. Given that I just bought the German book, that seems only appropriate. Plus, Sasha was really looking forward to this. Horizon, MCT, NeoNET and Renraku are to follow, as would be normal.

The chapter is structured as usual – first history, then an overview of the corp, then a more in-detail look at corp structure, then culture (and more structure, actually), and finishing with major (non-Lofwyr) players in the corp and an overview of SK’s headquarters, and a final warning about Lofwyr’s legendary vengeful nature. There’s also a German-only SK Germany section, but it’s not that notable as to need a description here.

One thing I noticed: Information density in the whole article is really high for a gaming book. While this makes reading a bit tougher – you can’t just crossread – it also shows how the author wanted to maximize content here, something I appreciate. YMMV, of course.

The history segment is solid, with some blanks being filled in (a bit on Michel Beloit’s maneuvering before Lofwyr), on Lowyr’s takeover, and on SK’s more recent history, such as the 2060 corp war, the founding of the NEEC, the inter-dragon conflict of 2073-75, and the current AI bodysnatcher crisis. I would have liked to see some reference to the European Reconstruction, which seems to have been a precursor to the NEEC project (or at least could have been soft retconned as such) and Alamaise sabotaging it, though. But history-wise, the 40s are kind of a black hole in SR lore.

Corp structure isn’t surprising, but contains a surprising wealth of new info anyways, how SK adjusted to the many challenges thrown before it. Some parts were amusing (like Dresdner and Commerzbank merging to stabilize the latter, heh), all of it was helpful to get a grip about what SK does in various markets.

I did really like the segment on corp culture. A clear, concise description of the interior workings of Krupp culture, from totally innocent corporate scouts (black neckties? Sorry Sasha, but it IS obvious to think of) to the Accentives program to corporate legislation, PR, finance management, and internal security. The Imperium romanum structure definitely suits Krupp and finally gives a guideline of how this mess is organized, one that doesn’t force a whole lot of lore to be hard retonned.
I would have appreciated a name and short description of Krupp’s scrip (since Cents are stated not to be scrip), but neither of the other corp chapters have any either, so it might just not have been on anyone’s radar. German replacing English as Europe’s lingua franca is a surprisingly current thought (though I cannot see it, given how hideous German seems to be to learn).

A description of SK’s global activities follows, offering another wealth of densely packed information about SK, which is nice, but oddly placed and a segment on SK’s corporate forces (but nothing on the Seemacht carrier. What happened to it?) and internal and external intelligence services. Nothing very surprising here, though SK Prime is notably downgraded from core holding AND intelligence agency to primarily Intelligence Agency only.

Finally, the major non-Lofwyr NPC are given some exposition. Lots of familiar faces (Scale, Brackhaus, Romanov, Hyvönen), but also new additions, sich as Basima Disaruíz, Awrah (a female Brackhaus?) and Harold Two Moon. Also, the Neu-Essen info from the German-only Rhine-Ruhr sourcebook gets at least condensed into an international book. Finally, yes, he’s out to get you if you cross him. Also, the Brackhaus myth is extended to pre-Lofwyr time. BRackhauses apparently have been around for a really long time.

Overall, well-written, very high information density, solid work.

Posted by: hermit Oct 13 2016, 08:35 AM

More review! This running review is brought to you by Google, the evil company in complete denial.

So, Horizon. Not my favourite mega, given that the writeups in 4E supplements mostly were oozing smug Silicon Valley arrogance (not intentionally, unfortunately), and that it was a distinct authors' pet in early 4E, and could do no wrong. That Horizon was used as a vessel for some bizarre in-world public mood swings, like about AI, and in a tell-don't-show way, didn't help. Neither did that it was a test bed for Eclipse Phase, a world with a very different mood from Shadowrun.

The current writeup is solid. It goes with the changing perception of the corporatized Internet as something not altogether good and questions the sincerity of Horizon’s googlish do-good-and-make-sude-it’s-high-on-everybody’s-newsfeed policy of charity. The history section has some inaccuracies – the Twins are just forgotten, and I don’t think an event that sinks half of southern California and has water flowing uphill a lot would be quite as forgettable – and the Deep Lacuna is incorrectly blamed on Halley (it was the cause of the Twins, rather), but for the most part it is a reiteration of canon, which in this context is a good thing. There’s even an attempt to criticize monopolized private media, something sorely lacking from previous, libertarian-leaning Horizon write-ups.

Current Events brings us up to speed with Horizon’s state in the late 70s, after losing a lot of its flair and the media war against the Azzies. It also covers the Horizon campaign nicely, from Christy Daee’s death due to software development screwups (A Fistful Of Nuyen) to the attempt to murder POWs and blame Aztech in Columbian Subterfuge, which apparently failed in official canon. And, of course, the Events in The Twilight Horizon, the Vegas Mancer Massacre, and the way the Consensus failed, are covered. Whoever wrote this was diligent with research, and I tip my hat to you. I do not think that a corp hat treats technomancers okay but really cares about the bottom line most is just as evil as a corp who cuts up mancer brains for giggles and mad science, but it might well have appeared to some mancers who had high hopes in Horizon. And gunning down protesters always is a stupid idea (much like direct democracy).

The chapter sums up, streamlines and somewhat corrects the narrative about the Consensus (the idea of digital democracy) and how it brutally misfired, tarnishing Horizon forever. Well written and pretty plausible (and with more than a dash of healthy criticism of social media echo chambers that threaten real, actual democracy in the real, actual world). It also covers what Horizon tries to do about this (ethics algorithms based on Asimow’s (fundamentally broken) Three Laws, which don’t work in the real world with real facebook’s immense hate speech problems). Add to that an apparently abysmally handled internal ranking reset (remember, in Horizon, the project manager of a work group is whoever has the most Likes) and a looming attack on Horizon’s AAA status, and Horizon has come into SR5 thoroughly humbled.

The next section gives an insight into Horizon culture, and here, as well, the Valley Boy bluster from Corporate Dossier has been dropped in favor of a more modern, critical look on “online democracy”. It highlights the fluid and unique structure of the corp and remains in line with previous canon without its often annoying authors-petting of the corp. It also describes the social consequences – constant awareness that you are being watched and evaluated and that the resulting Likes and Dislikes determine your career, for example (and the bullying this structure leads to). It is followed by notable subdivisions, pretty much the same since Corporate Dossier despite some updates – Charisma Assoc., Horizon Project, Horizon Transglobal (still no idea what it does now that Eclipse Phase is its own system), Pathfinder Multimedia, Singularity (now with a lot less technomancers) and the Dawkins Group. Nothing exciting, but solid stuff, the kind this book is meant to deliver.

All in all, good writing and a decent read to bring new players up to speed about Horizon. Would have benefitted from a bit more detail on Horizon’s local divisions (like how their involvement in Asamondo played out for them) and a missed opportunity to point out that Horizon owns Disney and SR fiction prophesied Disney’s acquisition of Star Wars before it happened, which is a slight bummer. But props for the mostly (Twins!) well-done research.

Posted by: Sendaz Oct 13 2016, 10:22 AM

Welcome back Hermit

And reviews!!! Yay!!

Posted by: apple Oct 13 2016, 10:44 AM

The US errata guy could do it.

SYL

Posted by: hermit Oct 13 2016, 10:47 AM

One quick note, in reference to my first review: In the German book, Fuchi has been changed to NeoNET and Guatemala to Yucatán.

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Oct 13 2016, 11:48 AM

My thought was that S-K is (beside being the dominant corporation in Europe) a well regarded employer. So many people strife to work for them and would learn German in advance, as they think this would give them an advantage. Besides Germany would be (like today) a very - if not the most - influential nation within the NEEC. In addition Germany is the 3rd biggest economy in SR (after Japan and UCAS). So there are several factors which - in my eyes - would lead to an increase use of German in the business world, even thou it's hard to learn.

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Oct 13 2016, 11:50 AM

To be fair and in addition to Heremit's review: My chapter includes several cases of odd phrasing and other mistakes, as my English is not as good as I wanted it to be.

Posted by: hermit Oct 13 2016, 12:56 PM

Well, it reads like it was writen by a German (or Russian, or someone from the Nordic countries). Given that's what Heisenberg is, I found it rather fitting. English is a malleable language that way; you can just import your favourite sentence structure and it will still work (try that in German).


Oh, I totally agree with you. It's even not entirely impossible that French and German become much more important (and english spoken much less) in real-life Europe after the disintegration of Britain is complete, given that I don't see little England retaining their standing as the world's 5th largest economy (which, by the way, would put it well behind France and California, though Shadowrun California probably has half the GDP of today's California, if that.).

English is easy to learn on a pinyin level, but good English is extremely hard to get right. Not even most native speakers are up to its many false friends (hoard/horde being a particular favourite of SR authors) and its unpredictable pronounciation. German, on the other hand, starts off hard, but becomes easier to handle once you get past all the pitfalls, like grammar, cases, plurals and long-winded sentences with split verbs at the beginning and the very end.

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Oct 13 2016, 01:49 PM

FYI: The author of Horizon also wrote the Ares chapter.

Posted by: hermit Oct 13 2016, 01:58 PM

Huh. I always try not to think about who wrote a text, but take it at face value. That's a disturbing gap in quality there ... was Ares really originally planned to be Plan 9's voice?

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Oct 13 2016, 02:01 PM

I know the answer, but no comment.

Posted by: hermit Oct 13 2016, 02:06 PM

Well. If that IS the case, tell the author my apologies, and he did a good job.

Posted by: Nath Oct 13 2016, 08:12 PM

I feel like we will never get to see to consecutive descriptions of Saeder-Krupp Prime that agree with each other.

When it was introduced in Corporate Shadowfiles, it was just a holding company inside S-K that duplicated everything, with its own subsidiaries and its own regional divisions and subdivisions. While a lot of people think "prime" meaning must be similar to latin Primus [first] (as in "Prime numbers"), I guess it actually referred to the prime symbol used to denote a derived function in mathematics or a duplicate groups of atoms inside a molecule in chemistry. It worth noting that S-K Prime was not supposed to have any function the parent company did not have, which would have included intelligence, and that the book also explains

In Corporate Download, that odd setup was given a purpose as a troubleshooting division to which subsidiaries who failed to meet their objectives were to report. It was also described as the only division within the corporation whom Lofwyr was not constantly restructuring.

Corporate Guide did state that a S-K regional division "coordinates intelligence, counterintelligence, and military operations within its region, often in tandem with a local Saeder-Krupp Prime office." The use of the word "often" would imply ot always and thus that regional division also have their own assets to perform those functions.
Then it described S-K Prime as "Funded by a very generous black budget", it "works like a global military intelligence agency" and whose "purview also includes internal security." While it "takes command of troublesome subsidiaries when necessary", I guess the rest of the description may have suggested to some that "when necessary" meant something quite different from a failure to meet quarterly revenue forecasts as it was in Corporate Download. Market Panic completely dropped that part. In the meantime, Spy Games may also have brought confusion by listing SK-K Prime as an intelligence agency.

For clarity, I suppose you referred here to Corporate Guide (who was translated in German under the title Konzerndossier).

Posted by: hermit Oct 13 2016, 08:34 PM

Ah. Yes, right. My bad. I only own German books and mis-retranslated.

Posted by: Sascha Morlok Oct 13 2016, 08:56 PM

Well, my main source was Corp Guide and the S-K description in the German-only "Rhine-Ruhr-Megaplex" sourcebook, where S-K Prime is mainly described as intelligence service. This was further amplified by the description of the Innenrevision (Internal Affairs Office) first in the German addon to Stolen Souls (which was then partly translated for one of the adventures in Bloody Business), which said that Prime was S-K's black CIA, while the Innenrevision was its black FBI.

I try to ignore Corporate Shadowfiles, except it's unavoidable.

Posted by: Blade Oct 14 2016, 10:18 AM

Probably because he's unaware that it exists. We know from Street Legends that Lofwyr has no knowledge skill about SK (while he has about all the other AAA), which also explains the constant restructuring.

Posted by: Jaid Oct 18 2016, 05:58 PM

isn't the US errata guy a freelancer volunteering their unpaid time?

seems a bit rude to dump that on them.

plus, i think we're still waiting on the management to actually incorporate errata into their books after someone points out where it's needed. so even if it gets done, it might not get into the books, based on past records.

edit:



wouldn't it be funny if all the restructuring was actually the result of lofwyr getting people's jobs wrong and everyone being too afraid to tell him he just called the security chief the VP of finance?

Posted by: Beta Oct 19 2016, 01:10 PM

You know, I could almost see this being a thing with dragons (at a less exaggerated level). Sure, they have amazing memories and all, but humans are so numerous, die off so often, and often are of so little consequence that I could imagine them occasionally losing track of exactly who is who or who does what.

Posted by: lokii Oct 20 2016, 08:59 AM

Master, the VP you are chewing on is supposed to be in a meeting right now.

*gulp* VP?? Again!?