Sure thing! Dragons are well-known for their empathy and their urge to care for the poor and the oppressed. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/rotfl.gif)
Only your third point, Malicant, has some reason in it: Of course, dragons need to learn the way humans "work". But isn't that part of their education? And, if not: Why the hell would they want to learn it from out of the shadows, which is only a small and very special part of society?
The whole chain of thought is silly. People keep on starting with the premise: "We want a shadowrunner-dragon" and then try to explain him into the shadows, against all odds. Why not follow a logical order of thought? We've got a young, unexperienced dragon, who has just become an adult and strives to build up a decent personal realm. Now, if you want to assume power, where would you begin? It would only be reasonable to seek the sources of power, wouldn't it? And it should be clear that the shadows are no such "source of power"; they are the waste of society, the domain of the powerless, not of the powerful. Power does not come from out of the shadows, but out of the corporations. Those capable of placing themselves at the top of a corporation are in control of money, contacts, (sometimes) military and followers (employees) - anything you need for a start. Thus, it would be far easier for a dragon to build up a realm of his own by getting involved with the corp scene rather than running the shadows.
A different approach would be to stick with one's own species: Young dragons could offer their services to older or even great dragons (comparable to the tasks drakes are given; of course, an adult dragon would carry out more important, dangerous and difficult missions than the drakes; anything else would be humiliating). That way, they would have a powerful guardian and maybe a future mentor teaching them more of the draconic secrets if they serve him well. From out of this stable "homebase", they may gather as much experience as they like and start acquiring up their own territory - either within the domain of their mentor (which is traitorous as well as dangerous) or by infiltrating a corporation as described above.

I think that having rules for Dragon PC's is ok, it will sell books, it's new it's different, it might be fun. Would I allow Dragon PC's in a normal game I'm running definitely not, would I consider running a special game that allows a Dragon PC? Possibly. I'd be far more likely to use these rules to flesh out a dragon as a Johnson or special adversary than any other use.

What makes you think this is necessary, or even warranted? If and when the developers come to Dumpshock and post comments or respond to questions, they do so because they choose to, not out of any outstanding obligation to explain themselves or their actions to you or I.

Because they are producing a product and I am a consumer that purchases said product and doesn't want to see them release a shoddy peice of work.

Did I ever say they try to learn it out of good will? I don't think so. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/ohplease.gif)


It's not part of their education. No "new" dragons were educated and born in the 6th world yet. The shadows are a small part, but dragons tend to have a lot of time on their paws, so they actually can maw the lawn a blade at a time. It is very easy to explain why a dragon is curious and/or stupid enough to run the shadows. Especially young adult dragons seem to have a tendency to be quite whack (see Eliohann, Nebelherr, Damian, Perianwyr).


You are one customer. Learn the difference. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

It is supposed to mean dragon in my case (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wobble.gif)

If it fits the other selections, rules for dragons are fine. Just adding dragons because an aprils fool joke was well received is what I would not want.

Obsidimen I could see emerging from their (exploited) liferocks, rather not amused they will be. Windlings or T´skrang would be rather young (or very small in numbers).

Dumpshock is not an official forum, and is in no way affiliated with Catalyst, FanPro, WizKids, Topps, Aztechnology, Stuffer Shack or any other corporation you care to name (in the exception that Adam has a dual role as Web Dude for Catalyst and volunteer Administration on Dumpshock). As such, any posts made by Synner or any other member of the staff or freelance corps is a courtesy. It is not some right to which you think you are entitled. It is not though any obligation that these people peruse Dumpshock at all, let alone respond to the occasional question or clear up the odd misunderstanding.

If you want an official answer to a problem that you have with the game, there are proper channels that you can pursue. You can access the often-updated Errata, or look over the freely provided FAQ, or even email one of the powers-that-be if all else fails. The email address is info@shadowrun4.com. Just don't bitch because Synner (et al) doesn't immediately jump quick enough at your beck-and-call here on Dumpshock.

You are quite right. I am just one person. And I have never intimated that I am speaking for anyone else by my one self.

Folks keep asking me to stop expressing my opinion and I thought that is what these forums are for.

Even the sub-title of this thread is "What is your vote let the Devs know"

I am letting the Devs as per one of my previous posts ( http://forums.dumpshock.com/index.php?s=&a...st&p=660533 ) what my opinions are. Now, as for 'expecting' a dev to respond. I dont expect anything. I will point out that Synner was more the happy to go a few rounds about dual-nature perception at the same time as the RC preview was being talked about. But never cared to hop in on the discussion, as per his right not to.

As a Dev that makes a product that, I assume, he wants to be well received amongst the fans and generate revenue for the company. I hope that he wants it to be a good product (if the preview wasnt a late April's Fool joke). The preview they posted was filled with errors, typos and simple bad rules mistakes. If this is a preview of a product, some folks could conclude the entire product will be full of these said errors, given that the preview was.

I don't want to see another typo trainwreck like Arsenal was ( http://forums.dumpshock.com/index.php?showtopic=20299&hl ). I want to see RC as a quality product.

Now, since no one seems to care if this is a quality product or not, I will not post another word about it.

But, one thing does concern me.



As a writer, shouldn't 'quality' be your almighty lord?

Why not? He's coming into a world where money means power. He has little money, he has some magical power, but nothing on the scale that the Great Dragons have. If he joins the corporate world, he is going to be subservient to whoever is placed above him, usually a metahuman of some type. He's going to be subservient to the whims of the corporation. Don't like the fact that they're practicing Blood Magic? "Shut up Employee #3245623 you have a contract...play ball, or wind up in the telesma lab."

Yes, life isn't going to be great for him as a runner either, but its simply another choice. Maybe the dragon is somewhat smarter and takes runs that further his goals. Maybe he's smart enough after a while to take runs that allows him to manipulate company stock prices so they're easier to buy up. Maybe he's doing it to get blackmail materials on Johnsons, fixers, or runners. Maybe he's just a bored dilettante who thinks that getting shot at is fun. We have several examples of dragons not fitting the norm of "Big old and scary" in DotSW, coming up with a plausible runner ideas shouldn't be too hard.

And Haesslich and Tessien are perfect examples. First, Haesslich is mearly a pawn in United Oil. Sure, he's got some clout, he's head of security. But that's it. He's got people he reports to. And while we may not know Tessien's reasons for running, the fact that its a Dragon running is all we need to know. Motivations, thoughts behind it, whether its for fun, blackmail, some debt being repaid, it just doesn't matter. And while you may not like the Secret of Power trilogy, the fact that its out there, and some of the first SR novels helps set the stage and influence people.

I answered Yes, Yes, NPC's, assuming a standard Shadowrun game. However, I would likely include them as a PC option with a well-written background, and the player understanding they would need to change to a new character if balance or play issues arose.

With a non-standard Shadowrun game, my vote would change to PC, assuming it was appropriate to the campaign. I have not done any detailed balance review or testing of what has been released so far, however, my gut instinct is the dragon's are currently to powerful, so any game they would be allowed in as PC's would likely have them modified from the printed version.

You know, this quote really bothers me, because it seems to smack of a certain sense of entitlement. Of course we should hope for quality work; grammatical and spelling errors only detract from the readability of a book, after all. But to say something like Arsenal is just riddled with errors and problems - ehhh, not so much, at least to my eyes. And I write fiction and "edit" (well, review doctor applications for a living! Yes I picked out one or two errors, but out of an entire one two hundred page supplement? Mountains and molehills, if you ask me.

You seem to act as though these writers are pushing shoddy works along, and the developer and editors just shrug and let it through. Not so much. Are you familiar with supplement writers? They're being asked to push out work under short deadlines with large wordcount totals, and are often in the process of researching information and discussing with the developer exactly what's being asked of them. Errors will slip through; you watch for it, but it's inevitable for a few to slip through.

"Ah ha!" so you say, "but the editors and developer should watch for such things!" Well, yeah, that's kind of their job. But they're working under the very same deadline date and they're also editing at the very least four or five books at the same time. There's a lot to keep track of, especially if there's a bunch of redlines that have to go out and have the writers fix.

It's an imperfect process and errors will show up. If Catalyst was pushing out books that looked like they came from the lower depths of GameFAQs, I'd be right up there with you with picket sign in hand. But one or two screw ups in a two hundred page supplement? Meh, there's more important things to worry about.

...unless (or in addition) you're complaining about what's actually inside the supplement - and that comes down to personal preference. Myself? Arsenal has lots of new toys in it that gave me all sorts of fun (and mean) uses for. I was pulling my girlfriend aside as I worked my way through the .pdf to point out neat new things for her mafia character to use. And new drones, cars, martial arts maneuvers - hell, it gave me a good jumping off point on a Portal inspired one shot I'd had kicking around my head.

So it's completely within your right as a customer to express displeasure over a product you disagree with, or with your perceived quality of Catalyst's books. But c'mon, you've quoted the same damn thing in three different threads. That's a little overkill there. You really want to make a statement right now, send a letter to them. A paper letter, because that means you actually give a shit about what you're complaining about. Or, you could go long term and not purchase any more of their product. Enough people do the same and the company'll change it's stance. But given what I've seen on this forum, most people are pretty happy with what's going on right now with the product.

I have one question How do very young dragons starting with the lowest dragon stats and no skills get stronger? Karma. The same reason many of us go on shadow runs. To get better at what we want to do.
I think the rules on dragons are kinda cool. In a 400 BP game, almost all of your points would go to race. leaving enough bp's for maybe sorcery sg 1 and conj sg 1. Whoopedee shit. Thats not game breaking.
i say if you want to play it play it. if you think it sucks fine, just don't try to tell everyone else that they can't play it. I'm personally for as much variety as possible, as long as it's balanced.
P.S. i would so totally love to play a dragon, but then that's me, I'm a fan boy. I think DOTSW was one of the best supplements in SR3.

My impression from spending a certain amount of time reading these boards is slightly different from that.

I think most people are pretty happy with the Shadowrun system and milieu as a whole, which is and has been strong enough to transcend the steep and capricious ups and downs in product quality that come with changes of devs and publishers.

And I think the problem of customer responsiveness by the devs and publisher is a real issue.

Competition tends to lead to quality.
As it is, there is competition between different companies - you can always quit SR and go to WoD or something.
That's a strong motivation for to keep people happy (and if you don't have your finger on the pulse of the wider base of players' wishes, then all you'll know if you fail is that you're failing, not why you're failing).

But ideally for Shadowrun lovers, there would be product competition WITHIN the game line.

The trick is, that would lead to inconsistencies in rules and canon that would corrupt the integrity of the system as a whole.

So, aside maybe from people competing to become freelancers, there is a lack of competition within the system. And if you love the system, which has spanned decades and is now on, like, its fourth major generation of developer (and its fourth edition), then you are loathe to throw out the baby with the bathwater, even when you have serious issues with either quality or setting direction, or both, in individual products.

So knowing that there are fans that will buy the product because of the system and pedigree it represents, largely regardless of quality, can give devs/publishers a bit of an Ivory Tower attitude. Not saying it exists right now - I honestly don't know - but structurally the threat is there.

Which goes to Ravensbane's insistence on responsiveness from the devs.
They don't have to listen to him, but they should.
And in the long term, how well they do that will determine the fate of the system.

Absolutely correct! All the more he should be determined to outrival his his bosses and take over control.
Haesslich (and other corp dragons) support this assumption: Haesslich is already head of United Oil's security department (naturally; to have a dragon as physical as well as astral defense is the best a corp can dream of). That way, Haesslich has already infiltrated the administrative structures of the corp, and he may continue his operations. We know enough about rivalries and intrigues within corporations, and we also know that dragons have a natural instinct for these kind of conspirations for power.



ad 1) Why passively wait for runs that further your goals? Why not actively hire runners yourselves and thereby ensure that they do exactly what you want?
ad 2) Again: "Manipulating stock prices" can be done by others. Why get involved personally?
ad 3) Blackmail material can be bought; and I doubt it will do your reputation any good if you start blackmailing campaigns against your colleagues, your fixer or your Johnsons.
Once more: Neither will the shadows get you the big money, nor the contacts or other material for seizing power. If you want to place a dragon in the shadows, you must either make him a real nutter or forget about the idea.



See, why don't you start coming up with some of these ideas? So far, you have uttered nothing but the assertion that "it's possible". How about some elaborate examples?



You don't really mean that crap, do you? Just because a Mr. Charrette (a novelist, and a pretty poor one, I might add) places a dragon in the shadows, we may stop asking for the motivations and credibility of that character? Who do you think Charrette is, the Shadowrun pope? I'd really like to see your GM's face when you tell him about the motivations of the dragon PC you brought to the game table: "Stop asking questions! Charrette did it, that's why my dragon runs the shadows." (IMG:style_emoticons/default/rotfl.gif)

Why force your socioeconomic manipulations when you can more subtly make minor adjustments to the plans of others and get your goals with less arrows pointing to you?Never trust mortals to get anything done right. So short lived, they'll probably die of old age while you are still explaining step one in your 27 step plan to a really cool hoard.No good defense comes to mind here, maybe scaley has a grudge?
There are many kinds of power, and the big players know this. If we're going to debate shadowrunners as a focus of power, why does Horizon focus on trying to own shadowrunners? Because they are a kind of power that is not yet consolidated.

When I saw the rules, I didn't immediately think, "basic shadowruns, but the Face has big fangs," and I absolutely didn't think, "ganger campaign with a confused leviathan," but the setting of SR is fairly abundant in possibilities, and if you aren't just going to throw the concept away from some personal hatred of dragons, you may find a campaign where they work.

Although now I want to play a clueless leviathan in a ganger campaign.

You participate criminal activities and thereby risk getting caught in the act in order to have "less arrows pointing to you"? That statement is devoid of any logic.



D'oh.
1.) As you might know, dragons do hire mortals. Go and check your sources, it won't take long to find examples (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)
2.) They need not know your "27 step plan". In fact, they hardly need to know anything. Give them a few orders and let them execute an operation, not a plan filling a lifetime. They are simply your pawns, not an audience for your elaborate lecture on how to dominate the world.

As for Horizon: Shadowrunners are a means, not an end. Having runners at your disposal is fine, being a shadowrunner, however, is not. (Guess I'll have to keep running in circles until that message is clear, hm?)

Wrong, it is in contradiction to your logic. It really depends on what consequences you'd rather face. By taking the role of one who is being manipulated, you are less likely to be recognized as a manipulator on your own (a good acting skill helps, and maybe a limp). There are options available everywhere, and taking certain risks reduces other risks.

And as you know, some don't.
Then we get back to how they will inevitably screw things up, reinforcing why not to hire humans. Tiny brains, no consideration for all the planned contingencies, useful for some things, but not anything important.

Much like having an army, or having money, or owning the media. Except some people do see those as ends type goals, so apparently power can be an end as well as a means.

Something everyone (regardless of your take on Dragons) needs to remember...

Just because you voted doesn't make you right. Just merely possessed of an opinion that may or may not be in agreement with others.

Not to mention certain dragons (greats at that) are known for being rather hands on when it comes to getting things done and ensuring they are done exactly as desired.

If one cannot perceive motivations why an ADULT Dragon (NON-GREAT) would choose to shadowrun, then you are simply guilty of not having a sufficiently large enough motivation. I'll give a hint to naysayers... the list of potential reasons is the same as the list you'd create for run-of-the-mill shadowrunners.

Love, Hate, Renvenge, Personal betterment, improve resources, take over an area, influence, money, power...

Need a I go on for more reasons why a Dragon would consider running rather than puppeteering?

Considering we're talking about Dragons that have only recently become Adult Dragons, with what is he supposed to be doing all this hiring with? He has no horde, he has no contacts,and he barely has the attention of any of the Great Dragons. I'm not sure why you think he's going to come into play with hundreds of thousands of nuyen in order to hire runners and set up jobs and what not. Sure, he may not be completely broke, and if he is manipulating the stock market, he has to have some, but maybe its just to find out things..like knowing that the MCT paranormal research lab just lost two head researchers may have value to him.

If he goes to a corp hat in hand "Hi I'm a dragon with no money, and skills on part (or less) than that of the average shadowrunner on the street, and I'd like a job..." He's screwed. There are confirmed stories of corps implanting cyberware into a dragon against its will, if the corp owns a dragon, do you really expect them to hold back on what they do with the Dragon? Some of the corps can force their employees into accepting cyberware for their job, what's the Dragon supposed to do if that becomes the case? Try to run away? Now they don't even have to pretend that the Dragon is a valued employee, they can hook him up like the other lab rats. I'm not sure why you think that being in a corp will be an easy time for a penniless dragon.



That's quite a poor attempt at rebuttal. At no point did I say that not knowing Tessien's reasons for running is a reason not to know a PC's reason for running.

I don't need to know Tessien's reason for running. Just like I don't need to know Hart's reason, or Lady Tsung's, or Dodger's reason for leaving Laverty's, or Marksman's or Archangel's reasons for running. Just because I don't know their reasons doesn't mean I can come to the table and say "Well, I don't need a reason, the same type of character was in a novel!" Don't be deliberately obtuse, it does your position no good. I don't have to know Tessien's reasons for running, simply because its not my character, nor is it a character in a game I'm running. And while you may not like Charrette's books, the fact that its in a novel that's part of the universe indicates that a runner Dragon is possible.

I have never suggested that a Dragon PC doesn't need to have motivations or reasons for running. Quite the opposite. I've stated repeatedly that like any character, they would need to fit into the campaign being run and the group playing.

Larme will now summarize the argument about dragon PCs:

Argument 1: "Cool, I might not use this, but to each his own."

Argument 2: "NO! It SUCKS and not only will I never use it, it will personally affect me if anyone else does in their own private games! I'm full of impotent rage about this!"

Victory: the reasonable position. No prize for guessing which one that is. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

Larme, will you stop being the voice of reason?

The correct answer is 2, btw. Can I have a cookie now?

Ever thought about marketing a dragon's enormous skills, especially on the magical sector? No? Think about it (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif) Magical competence is rare and therefore expensive in the Sixth World, and a character starting out with a magic attribute of at least 6 (max. 10) may earn one hell of a money for financing his first steps...



Sorry, but comparing a dragon to lab rats is simply ridiculous. Yep, a dragon may run away, if a corp makes a stupid effort at what you described. Wouldn't be the first time that a dragon "broke things", would it? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif) I agree that a dragon might want to take precautions when approaching a corporation. I also agree that the corps may force their employees to do whatever they want. A dragon, however, is none of your typical sararimen to be tossed around. There are also "confirmed stories" about corps drooling over getting their hands on awakened personnel. I am sure they would rip their fingernails off for getting a dragon into their ranks as an astral defense or security adviser. And what is the use in destroying that magical potential by implanting cyberware? (Which, by the way, is only one of many sectors of the market that not every corp covers; we're talking about A corps and below here, concentrating on on only one or two sectors, not about AAs or AAAs. I agree with you that running directly into the Paranormal Research Department of a AAA might have some... unpleasant consequences)



Once more, you compare dragons to mere (meta)humans (better this time than the lab rats, though). Humans are the standard in the Sixth World, and it is usual for them to run the shadows. Any way you look at it, dragons are not like this. They're rare and therefore special. And for them, running the shadows is even more special. With placing them in the shadows, you do something pretty unexpected, which is fine - as long as you justify it well.
Let me give some examples:
If Damien Knight suddenly sold his entire part of Ares and donated the money to the poor children in Yucatán; if Dunkelzahn had all of a sudden joined Humanis and started a campaign to eradicate metahumankind in the entire UCAS; in other words: if a special kind of character did something unexpected - would you just accept it? Hell no! You would ask for a reason, for motivations, or otherwise discredit that move as implausible.

Things happen, sometimes you know the reasons, sometimes you hear the excuses, often you know neither. That you cannot imagine a reason for something does not make it impossible, it merely shows a limit of your imagination.

To toss in a bit of substance, no, a corp would not treat a relatively weak dragon as a lab rat, if there was any reasonable chance it could escape. See Eliohann for an early example.

Well, most of the issues I've seen come from a difference of opinion. Faces are getting thrown down the drain, riggers are getting gimped by technomancers, why weren't there vehicle creation rules / proper tinkering rules in Arsenal, why did they give us the emotitoy...

The rest of the complaints are the result of people tinkering with rules beyond what most groups will see and saying, "why can't you fix this? Huh? Huh?" Mister Lucky and Pornomancer to aisle one please...

The silent majority seems to be, "hey, I've got an issue with x, y, and z. I've done this to fix it." Which is what discussion boards are for.



The only place that has more developer and freelancer input than Dumpshock is the WotC boards, IME, and that's because half of the population there is employed by Wizards. Have you ever been to the Privateer Press (Iron Kingdoms) boards? Their developers will pop in with an answer or two here and there, but mostly they're focused on their miniatures line. White Wolf pops up when someone's being an idiot or they want to make some big announcement (or, their web guy is explaining what got screwed up this time).

On that note, I was once told, point blank by a developer on the White Wolf boards that I should keep my big mouth shut when I complained about the destruction of the old World of Darkness. "You don't just don't get it!" was the answer I got then, and it soured me on the company completely. I understood why they were doing it - people weren't running the game the way they wanted it run, and were completely throwing the thing out to make it more appealing to the group of people that were fanatically connected to it.

You know what I did? I stopped buying their products. Oh, I still collect the old stuff second hand, and I've bought exactly one book since then (Changeling: the Lost, which we were hoping would resemble Dreaming to some point; alas it didn't, and I was stuck with a book about the awful experience of rape. Thank you, and good night).

The Catalyst crew really goes all out to answer questions and directly connect to the fanbase on Dumpshock, nearly every day. Synner has offered on a couple occasions to run an adventure for people misunderstanding rules (purposely or not). Ancient History does the Book Club threads as a way to give a sort of "director's commentary" to the books they've released. They even ask for comments, complaints, and suggestions for errata based on what they've published. Hell, half of the companies that are in the roleplaying industry right now would never even publish a .pdf of their game, let alone do so before the paper book comes out.

So no, I don't think there's a problem with developer / publisher input on these boards. I find it the complete opposite, myself.



Are you familiar at all with the official WoW boards? Hell, for that matter, any MMORPG board, or roleplaying board, or video game board, or any community based around a hobby?

Of course you want to keep your fanbase happy, but at the same time you can't listen to "WHY DID YOU DO THIS YOU...!" comments either. If things were done the way the fanbase would absolutely love it to be done, it wouldn't even appeal to even a quarter of the board!

Of course they're worth listening to, but a smart developer will approach complaints with an industrial sized grain of salt.



Because..?



So fix it. Homerule it to hell. Convert it to another system. People complain often enough about d20 games and convert them to whatever system du jour that they like. SR is no different. Just don't put it up in front of people like me and expect a, "my god! What I have I been running?" response from people who like what's being used currently.



The threat's there, but the threat is there in anything and with the current crew, imo, it's not something to worry about. Catalyst knows that it can't just print adalkjsalkdfj on two hundred pages and expect it to sell without any customer response. They're going to publish material that they think the majority of the player base will like. And as I noted above, the most I've seen is, "yeah, but why is X not there?" or "Y is overpowered!" which, again, comes down to opinion.



I don't doubt for a minute they haven't seen raver's posts, but then, they've been oddly quiet for the last few days. Vacation? Company problems? Bought out by CCP? I don't know. But I can wager they've seen what he's said and evaluated it, and stored in their headspace as something to think about if further and similar problems are posted among the fanbase. Like anything else, enough outcry and a response will come. They're not dumb, but they do know to listen to the signal and not the noise.

Look: I've posted an experience with a company that was so bad, I stopped completely buying their products. My girlfriend refuses to as well. Why? Because the company insists on acting like a prat to the whole of the hobby, not just their fans. They are the rule that I judge any other company interaction with. Compared to them, Catalyst is amazing. Of course, my opinion could change if I were to say, be told that my enjoyment of the option of a dragon PC somehow makes me a lesser roleplayer, but given what I've seen around here, I doubt it's going to happen.