What book would you save from the fire?, and which would light the BBQ? Options

[Cain]

Really, not a fan of Emergence?

Not really. It's basically a railroad book. The players might get to be nearby when cool stuff happens, but they can't do a damn thing to change it.

[TKDNinjaInBlack]

Eh, I guess I don't have a problem with just being "nearby." The devs are telling their story about what's important and world changing. I'll add my .02 Nuyen about how my characters react to that.

[Cain]

The best "world changing" events is where the players have a chance to affect things. For example, in Brainscan, the players are involved in the battle with Deus, even if they're not deckers and can't directly affect the cybercombat. In Harlequin, failure has repercussions, but doesn't cause total plot destruction. In Dunkelzahn's Will, you can't change the precursor event, but you sure as hell can affect the many, many plot threads that the Will leaves behind. Even System Failure has the opportunity for the players to feel like they're making a difference, if they choose to rise and lead the people. Almost makes up for the fact that they can't actually affect anything.

Emergence? Nope, not a chance. You ride the railroad, or else.

[TKDNinjaInBlack]

See, with all of the ones that you just mentioned I feel they are just like emergence. They will happen more or less regardless of what the runners do. I more or less rate things in the canon that the players can get involved in by grades;

Low grade involvement is street level or middle run level where their actions affect nothing at all. This is where the runners will do gang missions and not wipe any gang off the map, so their actions absolutely affect the plot in no regard. These are the mid level runs where the outcome isn't world changing (i.e. there is no epic device or super evil plot to upturn things on the world's face), and when things go down as planned or even if they fail, everything stays the same. These are also the high level epic runs where if the runners succeed and steal the epic device that can change the fate of the world, in the outcome, whoever owns said device will most likely buy it back or reacquire it through shadow ops of their own. (the ending of "On the Run" was like this. The runners got the disc, but through all their work and effort, JB's estate still ends up with the disc after they get paid because the johnson extorts the estate for hella cred and we never hear a release of the "lost" JB sessions).

Mid grade involvement is canonical involvement that is super implied but their actions are still by no means world changing. These are the runs that have the characters moving and shaking along with the key players, but regardless of what the players actually end up doing, the story goes down as planned because of the major parties involved and the runners most likely get shafted or left with some ridiculous parting gift. Even though system failure has the runners moving and shaking with Winternight, backing up Art Dankwalther pre IPO, or finding goons for Deus to recompile, those things will happen regardless of what they do.

High grade involvement is direct runner involvement in something that shakes the world. The characters are part of the team that was in the the MCT complex with the reporter to get the word out to the rest of the world about technomancer experimentation. The runners specifically helped unplug a said "saved" data haven from the Matrix during crash 2.0. They specifically found and disarmed one of winternight's nukes and prevented it from going off. Hell, even Harlequin's campaign, while his childish revenge, was world changing and the runners directly participated. These are the runs that if the players fail (or likewise succeed when doomed otherwise), the results will directly contradict the canon. This is thin ice to be treading because of the ability to ruin campaigns and the overall story the devs are telling.

When I run games, I keep them low and mid level. The high grade involvement is saved specifically for a last ditch end of campaign cure-all-end-all. After all, how many times can your one team get involved in all of the world's super awesome events? Even Assets inc. doesn't get that honor.

[TKDNinjaInBlack]

Where I was going with that though, is that with Emergence, you can fit your players in where-ever you see fit. They can be involved in that HK hospital run, chasing down escaped technos in chaotic HK, recovering Tlaloc's sample payload, or a secret part of the MCT secret footage run. It just takes a little creative interpretation to get there. It's not as cut and dry as System Failure is.

[streetangelj]

If I could recover any SR book I've lost, It would be my copy of Universal Brotherhood.

It's one of the few I've actually lost (I have nearly every non- adventure from the first three editions and 1/2 the 4th ed stuff) and I miss it, especially "Missing Blood" (the fiction half that was presented as a reporter's account that lucky players could actually get ahold of). That was some of the best horror fiction I've ever read and it scared my players so much that in my game they organized a massive campaign to destroy the UB after discovering it, blowing every nuyen and cashing in every favor to make the UB cease to exist --- and they were pushing prime runner status at the time.

I can see the point about some of the adventures being railroads and the various levels of effect on the game world; but as my example proved, a basic adventure can lead to a massive event that interferes with canon. It just requires work on the GM's part to find a way to work around such incongruities.

I'd only say one book i got for SR that was a complete waste was the 2nd ed reprint of the Street Samurai's Catalog since all it was was the original book with some blacked-out pages.

[Snow_Fox]

It's available on Amazon starting at $26 US. of ocurse the search that comes us when you just type "Universal Brotherhood" leads to some interesting titles.

[Cthulhudreams]

Out of the sr4 books, the core or street magic are the best, and unwired and runners companion are both fightlighters material.

And really out of those two... unwired is so bad, but so is runners companion. Urgh.