Oh... I see how it is Cain! Not taking the game at face value and instantly accepting everything you are given... well you can just get out and stay out with your calm rational argument! Take whatever you are given and be happy with it or burn heretic!

*/sarcasm off* (IMG:style_emoticons/default/grinbig.gif)

Note: I am being silly and this is no way has anything to do with anyone else's responses in this post. It's kind of tough when you agree with both sides, and none at all... don't ask.

I'd really prefer you made your points without upsetting the other members. The change caused by ruckus is not always a good thing.

While I understand your intent wasn't inflammatory here, you really have no idea when DireRadiant was born. It would probably be best not to assume you know when he was born.

The counter point being that a lot more do....

"The counter point being that a lot more do...."

You can't track this statement one way or the other. Most people who get fed up will just simply just stop posting for one thing, while people who like the game will still give it a thumbs up. There is not enough hard evidence to go off of right now until the long term book sales are in, and even then there is no real way of knowing what everyone thinks. To many factors to take into account. Both of you have stated a feeling based on pretty much nothing except what your gut tells you. Sorry but I feel that an argument on one side or the other is more or less pointless. Everything else is cool, but these kind of comments do not further the discussion, but only bog it down.

The really funny thing is that the devs then complain about the lack of page counts in books. There is a serious disconnect there somewhere.

But really this doesn't matter like rarity pricing on metatypes does. The gap between any two pistols is insignificant next to the Oni and ogres. The gap is the equivalent of like 75k nuyen. Thats a big gap. I don't care about two pistol options that cost 1/5th and 1/10th of a BP, when we have a 15 BP gap right there. Thats like 10 skillsofts.

I'm sure you can appreciate the difference in scale here. Anyway, I just tell my players to take the 'best' option, gun wise, and call it/style it whatever they feel like. I'm pretty flexible. If you want a railgun and all the railguns are terrible, you can use the 50 cal sniper and call it a railgun. Why would I care? I'm not here to brutally oppress my players into not playing what they want because its 'rare' in the game world (yeesh).



Probably not. But lots of people think its stupid, and have already started building fixes. Thats the joy of online communities. I signed up to the fix that made orks more expensive and elves cheaper ages ago. Excuse me for snipping the majority of the rest of your post. I never accused the devs of abandoning anything so that point is silly (I said nothing existed to abandon), and if no one aside from me cared, why are their two threads on page 1 right now about exactly that issue, one of which has no posts by me in it?

It's a forum. It supports a multitude of opinion.

And incidentally, it doesn't work. Either you are backdoor banning the character - free spirits are a great example of this. Why include unplayable rules? - or you are just ruthlessly punishing players who want to play a 'concept.' Anyone who chooses to play an oni or an ork is being punished by game mechanics for not playing an ogre.

So power gamers are just going to write down 'ogre' instead of ork and take his 9k nuyen to the bank, and anyone who actually wants to play a cool daemon from japan just gets to suck for no reason or has to play something that they didn't want to play.

Given that the makeup of the PC party is obviously stupid anyway (sammies with like 30 years wages implanted? Stupidly rare high powered mages working as criminals?) I'm not sure that making everyone play an ork actually accomplishes anything measurbly good and does encourage several things that are empercially bad (Unless you are in favour of min/maxes dominating 'role players' in which case more power to you)



You know as well as I do that GURPS is possibly the crappiest system ever. Seriously, it does everything badly, NONE of the costs are well balanced and it has a billion traps for the inexperienced player in character generation (Playing in a Sword and Sorcery game? Didn't know one level of whatever the skill that lets you kip up is mandatory? Prepare to suffer n00blet).

Sure, nice idea, but execution is terrible.

Champion is a supers game with knowledge problems of its own, but I've never looked at a book or played it.

Anyway if it makes you happy, yes, I am refusing to buy runners companion as it is a poor product. I have also refused to pay for unwired on the same basis. I do feel that the basic book (aside from the matrix) and street magic contribute significant value

It's hard to do once the battle lines have already been drawn. I do try and avoid outright flames and attack, although I do confess to resorting to snippiness and sarcasm. Really, there's some strong feelings on either side, and it's hard to post anything negative about SR4 without upsetting *someone*. However, I will stand by this one fact: when I make a nice, noncontroversial stance on a subject, I'm usually ignored. When I make a controversial argument, and defend it voraciously, a lot of discourse will result. Such is the way of the internet forum.

That's why I said "probably". If I was wrong, or if I offended him, I offer an apology.


Like MasterofM said, that's hard to quantify. I've certainly seen more suggested house rules on Dumpshock than I have for any other dedicated game forum, or even on RPG.net. That indicates that a lot of people aren't satisfied with the rules, they're just tolerating them and making patches as they go. I pay money for a product that requires as few patches as possible, and so do a lot of other people. I really, sincerely doubt that you'll find anyone who plays Sr4 without a good bundle of house rules, or ignore good-sized chunks of the game. So, I wouldn't say that a "lot more" people are satisfied with the way things are headed. It's a spectrum; it's all degrees of how dis-satisfied you are.

I think you are taking a micro view and I am taking a macro view. Quite simply, growth of the line supports my assumption.

I'm not trying to infer that everyone loves every aspect of the game. I think the rarity factoring is silly, but I agree with the general direction of the line. I think Peter is way to active defending his decisions. Rob's lack of posting added to the mystique. I really hate how an assault rifle is a better choice than and LMG in about every single case. I'm not going to belittle any of those points because as a generalization I more agree with the direction than not.

Some things will get changed and some will not. IMO the Unofficial Errata: Runner's Companion topic is a great example of the change Cain and Cthulhudreams were speaking of. Alternate Matrix rules and other house rule threads are a great example of options when a group of fans disagree with a subset of the rules that are not going to change.

I heard Runner's Companion sold out at Gen Con. I bought both Unwired and Runner's Companion there and feel that overall, both are good, playable products. In any case, you have exercised the strongest statement a consumer can make. You have voted with your wallet.... and so have I.

I will agree with redjack that aside from the matrix rules - which are really in a bad place because they are trying to guess what the future will look like and the bullshit professional 'futurists' running around cannot do that, let alone some RPG designers who have bigger problems - overall shadowrun is actually pretty well designed. (The matrix rules would be much better served by disconnecting themselves from whatever the future might look like and just trying to do something that is 100% focused on playability rather than trying something new all the time to keep up with the latest buzz words in IT.)

The basic mechanics for armour and shooting and character generation and sneaking and all that good stuff work quite well. Magic is probably the best magic system in any game in print currently. Melee is a bit tacked on but its a game with guns so who cares about the dude with a sword.

I have only skimmed through the last 3 pages but isn't the entire point of the argument: Post your criticism but don't be a jerk about it?

If not, I demant the return of the Lounge under the name of "Your Houserule Sucks!"

Part of this is that you can't really get useful feedback on issues from the people who know what the ideas behind the rules are. (Defensive posturing doesn't count as useful feedback) Particularly when you compare it to something like hero, where there is a rules question forum, and the line developer is the only one who can post answers. Which he normally does in under 24 hours. Most of the answers are of the "The text on 5ER 81, under the heading ..." type, but that's also how the several hundred page long FAQ got built, so some questions are non-obvious or just keep coming up.

lol. tbh, I wish the same quality of the magic rules was fully present in the matrix rules.

It would easily be the best RPG in print currently.

I'm a big fan of franks rules, and they have the mathematical quality (as he's photocopied the magic section's copies and changed the names), and they integrate well with gameplay (thanks to the xeroxing), but they don't quite permeate the setting in the same way which is a shame.

Do you have any evidence that 4th edition has more overall players than previous editions?

I really don't think 4th edition has caught on the way previous editions have. The game sells that is obvious but stores don't move the volume of Shadowrun books I've seen them carry and sell in the past. That is just the stores in the places I have lived though and doesn't mean anything unless someone has numbers.

and beyond the numbers of any edition, is it possible to do it much better than currently?

The arguments for 4th edition that I've seen have nothing to do with the health of the franchise. They simply have people stating that they like what they play (duh, the same can be said by any fan of the games that tank horribly) and they want it not to change (for better or worse).



That doesn't mean much. Hardback 3rd edition sold out in like a few hours at Gencon. They didn't make enough though. Gencon is also one venue and you can ask Wizkids and WotC about numerous games they've sold out at GenCon that were abysmal failures that the company took a huge loss on. I'm not a fan of the edition, but the better argument is simply that CGL doesn't show the signs of losing money on Shadowrun.

But the simple fact that there are a large number, and obviously large number by not just these forums but many other gaming forums is that Shadowrun has a lot of disgruntled fans from previous editions. That fact that they're still fans who talk well of the setting means that they're all highly potential customers CGL is failing to capitalize on. So obviously if they were able to deliver a product that satisfied those fans as well as the current ones they could sell more product and make more money.

Sadly through the life of 4th edition at Fanpro and CGL I've not seen anyone try.

But we still remain fans and know that "this too shall pass". In fact fans of the franchise left unhappy by 4th edition are logically going to encourage the demise of 4th edition till they get something they like. Just like it is with many other franchises which are left to wallow until someone visionary reinvigorates it in a way to attract old fans while growing new ones.

Yes. Boiled down that was my original intent.

Fits into your sig, doesn´t it (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

Yes, it does. However, I didn't think to boil it down in that fashion because A) ironically I wanted to be more clear than that (which ended up obfuscating my meaning unfortunately), B) that has zero impact - it's a statement that's easily ignored, for the reasons Cain is talking about, and primarily C) I just didn't think. 404 - Brain Not Found.

Addendum - Of course it helps that I had been up about 24 hours when I came up with this harebrained idea. Not an excuse, but whatever y'know?

This has been a really interesting discussion, albeit on that has chewed up about 30 minutes of my morning, but hey, I'm at work, getting paid AND surfing the internet, so I really can't complain without coming across as an idiot:)

I think there are a lot of egos at play, not just between devs and DSF members, but just in general when feedback is delivered. The biggest thing a forum does is solicit feedback whether people want it or not. I work as a analyst, focused on updating and releasing a package of software, so I think its fairly similar to the process of producing an RPG book. And I know that while our devs get 5-6 weeks to code and my team gets 3-4 weeks to test, it rarely seems to be enough and we are always having to go out with some flaws that we are aware of. Sometimes we disclose that and other times we just let them roll, plan to fix them in the next release and hope that someone doesn't find them before that.

And, because our team has spent a lot of time planning and drafting all these changes, when someone out in the field says that something is wrong, the initial goal for any of us is to prove them wrong. So, we look to find evidence that it is really working and the problem is with them.

Point is, the bigger the egos that are floating around, the harder it is for a side to admit a mistake and fix it.

But, there is a big difference between a printed book and a piece of software...I have one copy to deal with. So, if I make a fix to a typo or a huge piece of function, well, its takes literally a few days to get that out into production. You can't go printing a new run of books 2-3 times every month, else you lose any sort of face with the consumers...

But to TRULY analyze the math and provide legitimate statistics you have to cross reference to the industry as a whole, which has suffered since the time of sr3 due to computer games.

I'm talking about sr4 beginning to now. The game and player base is growing, not diminishing. Could it grow at an even faster rate? Without a doubt. Then we digress to a business marketing analysis and the question then becomes: Will tweaking the rules or tweaking the marketing plan increase the user base? I actually would hypothesize that the latter would carry more bang for the buck.

But this is really semantics, a WAG at statistics and my opinion/your opinion. In the end, we both seek the same result: A better Shadowrun game. Regrettably, my style of play will not be exactly the same as your style of play, so even if one of us gets the perfect game the other the other definitely doesn't. I have chosen to be a promoter (as opposed to a detractor) of Shadowrun even with its small flaws (Please don't interpret that as me saying anyone specific is a detractor). As the saying goes, pick your battles. Since I know I will never get every fix I want, I work towards getting the ones most important to me. I watch for and use the methods that are truly most effective at getting results over the long term.

Final Thought: The loudest voice sometimes get early recognition. The strategy is ineffective in the long term.

You insight is well timed, very in tune and parallel to the experience I was attempting to translate into the RPG gaming industry (though you seem to have summarized it better).

Excellent observation. This highlights the need to consider not only various 'camps' of existing players, but the first impression given to potential new customers.

Yeah. It's called "Fourth Edition." (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

Somewhere, someone must have stats of units sold of SR4 materials. In the comics industry the number of titles sold per week is made public knowledge.

I would advise against making such data available in a shrinking market with low margins. Knowledge is power.

Just to dash in with a quick post about the health of SR4: SR4 as a line is selling strongly, and for a non-WotC RPG in the current market, doing very well.

Looking forward to pumping out some great stuff for the 20th Anniversary, for current and lapsed players alike. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Uuuug... Redjack can you not see this has still just created circular arguments? It all boils down to what camp you are in, and since there is not enough hard evidence (I'm sorry but there just isn't) neither side is right or show clearly enough that one side is right and the other is wrong when dealing with a fan base. I unfortunately believe that after unwired and runners companion came out that there might be a big difference in sales. Now I am only using my gut, and I could be right or I could be totally wrong yet there is really nothing to go on but my gut right now so we will see how that goes. The only basis I have to go off of my decision is my reasoning. The BBB and Street Magic were both good books that brought quite a lot to SR 4th ed. Augmentation, and Arsenal also helped out at our table although I found that the fact there was no index was somewhat of a turn off (because when I am trying to find a certain rule it's a pain to flip through the pages until I find it or sticky note the book,) and was actually not to pleased with the quality of the paper used in Arsenal. These are minor details that can be overlooked as well as some of the rules on the items brought up in these two books can easily be ignored or overlooked which again is totally fine (emotitoys as the primary example,) as you have a nice fairly soft pillow that is the BBB to fall back on.

Where I base the problem is in the most recent two books is that there was a large part of the fan base that was hoping that Unwired would make hacking easy, more effective, and gimp the effectiveness of script kiddies. Didn't quite happen that way. Yet most of all many people were looking forward to Runners Companion for the meta variants and new playable races. It is a mixed bag who do or do not like this, but if you get burned twice when looking at the rules and both times when the issue is raised the answer is "Tough cookies. It isn't getting changed so don't even bother talking about it anymore," People are not going to buy the next installment in the series. Now how many people do this and how many people keep buying the books is something that will only show months down the road. I like SR and my view is somewhat grim, and maybe I am wrong and maybe I'm right. Maybe it's not a large part of the fan base that wanted to see changes in hacking and the meta variant thing (you can't really quantify what people want and who will buy what until later down the road.) Only time will tell if you are right Redjack, or I am. I hope you are, but in the end it would be nice to see more quality work like the BBB or Street Magic when the next installment of books are made. These books might have their problems too, but they are a good buy. In the end all of this talk is of the future, and I am perfectly willing to sit back and let the future become the present instead of trying to predict it.

It helps no one to stick your head in the sand. The comics market had a huge downfall in the 1990s but has been making a very slow comeback with it's various niche markets. That data is easy to find with a google search. In fact... I just did one for PnP RPGs! According to 2007 sales charts, RPG sales are on a slow uptick overall and FanPro (who I believe was publishing Shadowrun at the time) had positive, though small, sales growth.

If anyone can provide more current sales data, I'd appreciate it.

You know, for the first time in forever, I can't tell if you're joking or not.

I think he's serious. I agree with him to a point...it would be nice to have someone looking over the math, but I'd rather not have a bunch of academics deciding the direction of a game, holistically, at least. You want that aspect covered, so you don't have problems down the road, certainly, but math isn't the only thing a fun game has...you don't want the math to break a game, so that angle should be covered.

My assumption is that most "play testers" are not given a whole game to read, digest and run. They are given certain parts and looked to run certain tests and get back to the devs. That's the most efficient use of everyone's time, albeit not the best way to ensure consistently throughout. I mean, I might be given an encounter to run with 4 or 5 pregens. That doesn't test the validity of chargen, it doesn't tell me how they are balanced...I mean, its a slice of the rules in a limited scope.

But all that testing takes time, and setting up those scenarios, frankly, doesn't take passionate gamers to do...it takes analytical types that can cover the majority of the bases and point out the flaws and successes.

I don't know, nowadays, "games" are so focused on balance...that's a lot of weight on everyone's shoulders to make sure all the pieces come together in a compact system that plays smooth AND is fun...that's a tall order...

Not really, there have long been computer games. Heck I'm no spring chicken but I was raised from childhood on a TI-99/4A playing computer games long before their were PCs or Nintendos. Computer game companies are simply getting better at reaching out to their market and making better games. Something traditional roleplaying has been slow to catch up on. Digital distribution is one of the things where traditional RPGs are starting to learn and adapt.

Anyways you and another poster also missed the second part of my thread which attempts to look at the bigger picture:



All the disgruntled players are not only potential profit not realized, they're a weight on the company and developers. Just look at it here in Dumpshock and after these years that SR4 has been out you still take a beating and a colder reception than necessary. In the case of Shadowrun X-box this broke FASA interactive. I was initially and briefly part of early beta for that game and a lot of Shadowrun fans flocked to it and disappointedly found it wasn't Shadowrun (consider it a version like SR4 is a version but without the fluff/history) they wanted. These players weren't upset with gameplay, or first person shooters, they were upset with how the story was handled and large numbers of players turned their back on the game and refused to buy it. This was probably one of the points that tipped that company over into the loss category.

But the franchise continues on. Shadowrun is still a strong franchise and Smith & Tinker formed to take up the license before the dust have even settled from the end of FASA interactive. I have high hopes with Jordan Weismann in control of the new Shadowrun computer game it will be the game also us refugees of Shadowrun 1st-3rd are looking for and they will capitalize on old players will growing the franchise heavily with new ones.