Shadowrun: Cyberpunk and what's next? Options

[Demonseed Elite]

The mentioning in the other thread about Shadowrun being "furry" got me thinking. Long ago, Shadowrun was a spin off the cyberpunk genre, complete with its typical elements of dehumanizing technology, faceless megacorporations, edgy yakuza, chrome, leather, and cyberdecks. Since then, the authors of the cyberpunk genre, people like William Gibson and Bruce Sterling, have said that cyberpunk is a literary genre of the past, less relevent in the modern age and having suffered from its elements being commercialized (Shadowrun, interestingly enough, being an element of that commercialization).

Since then, those authors, as well as others, have moved into what they call "post-cyberpunk" and "slipstream" literature. Post-cyberpunk has many elements of the cyberpunk genre, but its characters are usually less dehumanized and more an integral part of an evolving world. Neal Stephenson's The Diamond Age is seen as a good example of post-cyberpunk literature. Slipstream literature is usually rooted in the existing real life day, but with a fantastical twist of some sort. Books like William Gibson's All Tomorrow's Parties or Tad William's Otherland books are seen as slipstream, as well as most of Bruce Sterling's recent books.

Anyway, the point of this thread is that when I sit and look at it, it seems to me like Shadowrun is picking up these fundamental changes, intentionally or not, and it is shaping the game. Technology has become less dehumanizing in Shadowrun; most players don't use cyberware to make their characters "inhuman" but are leaning towards more unobtrusive 'ware or bioware. Decking moves more towards "Matrix-on-the-go" and working deckers into mainstream play, as opposed to seperating them into their own isolated world.

What about the faceless megacorporations? Well, I'd argue they've become less faceless. The corporations have been linked to "personalities", either in the corporation itself or in key celebrity figures in the corporation (Richard Villiers, Damien Knight, Lofwyr, etc.). In addition, the overwhelming power of the "Big Eight" has not only been expanded to ten, but has been eroded by an increased focusing on smaller corporations and the entire corporate world as a business ecology.

Elements like yakuza, chrome, leather, and cyberdecks are fading away into a myriad mass of evolving ideas. The yakuza are one of many; not only in the criminal element of SR, but now so much of the game also revolves around organizations people form to fulfill a role in the global society. The Draco Foundation, Yucatan rebels, the New Revolution, the Roman Catholic Church, etc. The world is not run entirely by megacorporations anymore. Icons like chrome and leather and cyberdeck cables have turned into orksploitation, neo-tribalism, and the Wireless Matrix Initiative.

The world of Shadowrun is looking more like our own real world with a fantastical twist, like Slipstream literature. It's even moving towards mimicking elements in the real world, like wireless technology or genetic engineering, in exchange for sticking to traditional cyberpunk elements. Shadowrunners have moved away from being dehumanized, obsolete humanity railing against a corrupt social order and more towards an underground, but necessary, facet of 2064's social order who help define the world, even if that isn't their goal. Just look at how many of the recent events in Shadowrun's world were influenced by the actions of shadowrunners. They are far from being cut out of the world; their strings pulled by faceless megacorps. The world of Shadowrun is populated by hundreds, if not thousands, of communities based on various ideals that form an ecology in the world, more like The Diamond Age's phyles or Snow Crash's franchised institutions than Neuromancer's faceless, monolithic megacorps. Even Shadowrun's recent horrors, like the Renraku Arcology shutdown, were an optimistic view of technology (the ideal of a perfectly-run and user-friendly arcology) turned horribly wrong by the frailities of humanity (religious otaku cults and an AI who seeks basic "human" rights).

And when you factor in magic, Shadowrun's truly fantastical twist on an otherwise very "realistic" world, it's mostly a humanizing factor, not a dehumanizing one. Magic empowers the individual, is based on communal ideas of schools and religions, and brings people together in ritual and ceremony as opposed to the cyberpunk idea of technology seperating people and dehumanizing them.

Anyway, I wouldn't be afraid of the idea that Shadowrun is drifting from cyberpunk ideals, because even cyberpunk has drifted from cyberpunk ideals. I think it's more interesting to talk about what Shadowrun might become in light of these literary and social changes.

[Ancient History]

Ah, c'mon DE. Throw a little John Shirley in there, hit the roots rather than the tree.

Seriously, we're rapidly reaching the end of definative trends and styles in literature. The Mirrorshades group has moved up and out, and so has everyone else, just like music is no longer "Rock n'Roll." So maybe SR is a little less punk and a little more like the future as it would be today. It's grown up a little. I think that's all to the good.

[Demonseed Elite]

I'd definitely include John Shirley in the whole phenomenon. He's one of the fundamental (if not the fundamental) cyberpunk author, and even his recent works reflect the changes that have gone on in the genre.

And yeah, I agree that SR is growing up and that it's a good thing, and that the players should struggle less with Shadowrun's moving away from cyberpunk ideals and focus more on what Shadowrun should be from here.

[Patrick Goodman]

[nezumi]

Good way of putting it, DE. I've looked back on CP2020 and the like, and really, the games seem to lose their appeal fast. I don't share the dreams or fears they try to capture. While I do enjoy putting my shadowrunners in that sort of position occaisionally, the fact is it is becoming more 'slip stream', and those are the stories they seem to appreciate more.

Nevertheless, it does bring a tear to my eye. Our little boy is getting all grown up! *sniff* I'll miss you, silly +1 to impact leather armor, and you too mister mullet guy fighting all the ghouls.

*sigh*

[Demonseed Elite]

[GentlemanLoser]

You mean Billy CromeArm? :P

[Jrayjoker]

IIRC part of the reason SR3 has moved away from the bitter disenfranchisement of cyberpunk is because the people who GMed it and played it had a significant impact on the development of the game. Part of 3rd Ed's intro actually credits the evolution to input from GMs and players of the previous two editions.

Frankly I am very pleased that the world view has changed from the anti-utopian feel of cyberpunk to a more credible future-fantasy with all the inherent difficulties that the changes have wrought.

I could never get into the pure cyberpunk world in part because it took a lot more energy than I was willing to expend to remain bitter and disenfranchised for an entire gaming session. I guess that is why I couldn't stay Goth that long either. :spin:

[Birdy]

Looking at the trends both in Shadowrun, roleplaying in general and literature:

+ They go further down the "Your either a mage or you're useless" road

+ SR get's another FeyFantasy with guns POS


Birdy

[Jrayjoker]

[Guest_Crimsondude 2.0_*]

[Xirces]

I think that the whole notion of Cyberpunk and thus SR (still) is that the protaganists of the story (ie, the players) should be fighting against the extremes of (current, modern day, RL) society as projected into a future world where everything is much worse. Back in the 80s it seemed like the future would either be CP (Japanacorps, big brother etc) or some sort of post-apocalypic thing. It just looks a bit naive now.

Look at what's shaping our world today - big government *in conjunction with* big corps - American/Western corruption, control of citizens, the environment, the media - some of the themes are the same, but look how things are different and project forward 60 years, toss in magic and stir well...

When SR was writtten I'd never used the Internet - I had no idea of what a multinational information source (like the matrix) could do - even just the simple act of discussing a SR sourcebook was impossible beyond your immediate friends. There was no notion of information sharing in that way, controls been handed on down from the music and cinema industries fighting for their lives. Anyone in their late teens/early twenties now cannot imagine just how different the world is, in so many ways.

In some ways we've lived through the revolution, but there's still a fight - good SciFi literature should point us to where we'll be and what will happen and beyond all else - SR is good scifi literature.

(that probably made more sense to me. Flu remedies and wine don't mix.)

[Nath]

Transporting the cyberpunk genre in Seattle in 1989 ought to naturally result in something with lighter tone, that we could have appropriately called "cybergrunge" ;)

[Guest_Crimsondude 2.0_*]

[The Grifter]

[hahnsoo]

The central themes behind cyberpunk are mostly relevant in Shadowrun, although I agree that Shadowrun is more of an alternate history (similar to historical fiction novels) than traditional cyberpunk. The main themes are Man's inhumanity to Man, the dehumanization of Humanity through the ravages of poverty, industrialization, and social injustice, and the meaning of consciousness. Themes like these also are found in literature in the early 1900s (books like "The Jungle" and to some extent, the Communist Manifesto) born out of the industrial revolution, but Information Age technology adds a new wrinkle to the whole equation. These themes are still relevant in Shadowrun, perhaps even more so than in traditional cyberpunk because it is based on the trappings of a real world and the introduction of magic not as a panacea, but as another way that "technology" contributes to societal injustice (as the arguments over at the Adepts of SOTA 2064 thread suggest) and dehumanization.

[Guest_Crimsondude 2.0_*]

What's this "justice" thing you speak of?

[hahnsoo]

[Edward]

Part of this evolution is the logical extension of a true cyberpunk world given human nature and intelegent corporate operatives.

A faceless megacorperation is going to be preserved distant and hurtful buy the public, this will damage the bottom line so they present a public face. And while it is true that shadowruners have influenced major events that is usually one very lucky group of runners in the rite place at the right time. very rarely can a runner choose to do something that truly affects a megacorp.

As to the move to les obvious ware this to is a logical evolution, most runners prefer not to be seen or to be seen and ignored, this is a lot harder with a shiny creme cyber arm, ask a navy seal to carry a dozen mirrors on the outside of his gear on a mission and what is he going to say. I would have liked to see cyber arms be ether cheaper or stronger so they have something to offer over muscle toner and booster but t the least they should be vaguely flesh toned and coverable with a shirt (even the obvious ones) to get away from the shiny thing giving away your location problems.

Faith can never disappear, especially in a downtrodden population. What people have faith in can change but belief in something good and greater than yourself is the only way to stay relatively sane when there is no hope of bettering your situation and the only step don is somebody steals your box (I say relatively sain as arguably faith is a delusion depending on wether r not your right, and they cant all be right).

I think it makes much more sense as it is in SR

Edward

[Guest_Crimsondude 2.0_*]

[Crimson Jack]

I love the evolution of the game. Couldn't be happier. I cringed a bit when I read about SURGE, but its a flavor thing really and there are plenty of elements of the game that I only use when I need to.

The point about the metallic shiny arm thing is both funny yet understandable. It only takes a few hundred dead street sams before the next generation realizes that low-key is better than flashy, for running. Its a logical progression.

I found that "furry" comment an unusual way to describe the evolution of the game btw.

[Paul]

CD2.0 said most of what I would have, but I'll come backlater to say more. Work is soon, so my time is pressed.

Growing up doesn't mean you have to stop being cool, or that you run out of ideas.

[Crimson Jack]

[DarusGrey]

[Pistons]

[Guest_Crimsondude 2.0_*]

[Guest_Crimsondude 2.0_*]

[DarusGrey]

Yes, but my point is given the oppurtunity(via at least in SR, several major rulings and circumstances), it *is* profitable to a corporation to control people's lives, *especially* thier employees, who they get an immense ROI on in that situation.
Same reason most companies include health benefits and such to employees, it isn't directly profitable, but in the big picture it benefits the beast.

Fictional example:

you pay joe wage-slave $100,000 a year, we'll assume he maintains a standard 1-1.7 rate of return a fairly standard figure by today's standards at least(aka, for the $100,000 a year you pay joe, his work generates on average $170,000 for the company, gross, not net).

He lives in corp housing, eats corp food, shops at the corporate store, etc.

Lets assume he spends 100% of his income and relies on some corporate 401k for his retirement.

$80,000(80% I previously stated, probly lowball) a year he spends on corp produced goods/services.

Most retail products/services maintian a 4:1 profit to cost ratio for retail, and the same for manufacturering (it costs $5 to make, you sell it to walmart for $20, who in turn sells is to you, the consumer, for $80).

Since hes spending his 80% on corp goods/services from the corp, they get the very good 16:1 return, maybe %10 off for some employee discount plan or something, but won't confuse the math at this point for that.

So, if the $100,000 a year they pay joe , he returns $70,000 to the company in productivity, *and* 75,000 a year in profits off sales.

Meaning the company is in reality paying him absolutley nothing to do his job.

Services like garbage pickup ($15 per week), water ($30/w), administrative($100 annual), security ($3,000 annual) even if the corporation paid for his housing a bills ($1200/m)(though this is unlikley..plus sourcebooks mention they give the housing at discounted rates in the few examples).

These costs are far over-exceeded by the money joe brings back into the fold by being under the corp's thumb.

If joe was "outside the fold" then its likley only about 30% or less of his income might see its way back to the corporation.

Again, if given the option, it is *very* much in the corporations interest to basically run people's lives, like many things, theres no direct profit, but any aspiring accountant can easily figure out this would be a huge profit getter as standard policy ;>.

(I'm pretty sure my costs are mostly accurate based on current RL costs, though I can't account for the vast volume and such a AAA corp could in theory use to affect the numbers, chances are they're very over-stated in this scenario, as well as the fact that said corp only has to pay cost(+oppurtunity) for services/goods it creates in the application of living condition maintenance).

[Paul]

[Paul]

Okay I ca't figure out why my post is fuxxored.

[mfb]

you have to note who's being quoted. {quote=mfb}blah blah.{/quote} replace the {} with [], obviously.

[Nath]

Nah, you don't need to specify a name. I think it's only because he mispelled on that one, at the beginning:

"[QOUTE]And yeah, I agree that SR is growing up and that it's a good thing, and that the players should struggle less with Shadowrun's moving away from cyberpunk ideals and focus more on what Shadowrun should be from here. [/QUOTE] "

[Demonseed Elite]

Paul, you're interpreting some of my opinions too far. I don't have anyone in my games interact with Damien Knight or Lofwyr or anything. They never get that close. But in the game world, when a megacorporation does something now, it's usually attributed to a personality. Damien Knight is going for this, or Lofwyr wants that. It's not very faceless. The corporations seem to have distinct faces more than just "Ares."

And the relationship between man and technology is still immensely important, just different. In the game world of Shadowrun, people seem less alienated and dehumanized by technology and more adept at working technology into humanity or adapting humanity to technology in a synergystic fashion. Which reflects our current real life views about technology and how they have changed since the 80s. In the 80s, America was losing jobs to Japanese zaibatsus and was worried about acid rain and greenhouse effect from industrial pollution. That went to American dot-commers living it up and a cellphone, iPod, and hybrid car for every man, woman, and child. We've come to accept, even shape, our relationship with technology. If there's an underlying anxiety now, it's in extremist and fundamentalist groups utilizing our technological society against us in terrorism. Which has crept into Shadowrun in interesting ways (what is the Renraku Arcology situation if not an originally-optimistic technological infrastructure being usurped by fanatics?).

Personal views about religion aside, Shadowrun has never stressed a dehumanizing factor in magic. Pretty much the opposite, with its focus on neo-tribalism or the integration of mages into society through corporations. There's a whole lotta communal activity in Shadowrun magic, from an economy of traded foci and formulae, to magical initiatory groups, to a shaman communing with their totem.

[hahnsoo]

[Demonseed Elite]

[hahnsoo]

[Garland]

I think magic can be a little dehumanising, on the shamanic side of things. You've got people striving to emulate their totem, be it Snake, Crab, Fenrir, etc. Some of these totems can lead to some pretty bizarre people, especially if things get played up. And then there are toxic shamans...

[Guest_Crimsondude 2.0_*]

They strive to live up to the principles of their totems, not emulate them.

[Rev]

Company towns have existed, and do exist now. Places where the corporation owns the land, the houses, the furniture, everyone works for the corporation, etc. Throw in a company controlled pension you loose if you quit and the corporation might as well own the person after a couple decades.

I actually find the snow crash style of things more plausible than the company town model, and very compatible with the old feeling of shadowrun. People living prepackaged lifestyles in corporate owned neighborhoods. This is actually a reasonably large business for disney today. They have at least a few such "towns" where people are living their whole lives in the disney bubble. The big trend in malls today is supposedly the "town center" which is physically modeled after a real small downtown, but without the civil rights and with a bunch of huge parking lots next-door. Throw in a bunch of cross promotion, incentives, etc then transfer the tribalism many americans today feel about thier government to their corporation and it is very easy to see a large swath of people interacting primarily with one corporation. I knew quite a few people who were ridiculously loving of thier corporations during the 90's when they all expected to get rich from them. Sheesh talk to somebody who works at microsoft for years (not somebody who leaves, somebody who stays), it can get extreemly creepy.

[Paul]

[mfb]

[Garland]

[Wireknight]

I wrote a section for SOTA:2063 on health spells' applications into genetic engineering and bioware, as well as the engineering of certain Awakened traits, under the catch-all term "Magenics". This was stated as a push toward the more biotech(rather than cybertech, though not in exclusion of) friendly idea of post-Cyberpunk, which I think Shadowrun has a unique path towards, vis-a-vis its integration of magic and technology. I am a fan of certain cyberpunk authors' works, and the genre itself, but having read a few post-Cyberpunk novels, such as The Diamond Age and Transmetropolitan, and been very impressed, I am of the mind that Shadowrun has the means (see above) and the drive to evolve a bit into the post-Cyberpunk genre/era.

Cyberpunk was a product of the 1980's, a time when the Japanese were producing the absolute cutting edge of technology, Japanese corporations were overtaking markets where American interests had prior flourished, glass and chrome corporate culture was at an alltime peak, computer technology for the home user was a new and innovative concept, and biotechnology was a futuristic bogeyman that rarely made the headlines. Greed was good and the idea of genetically engineered or nanotech-augmented humanity had by and large not been considered. It turns out that the Japanese didn't take over the global economy, information systems integrated with, rather than mutating, culture and society, and cocaine-snorting men in five thousand dollar suits with cellphones the size of small cars ceased to be the apex of corporate haute couture. It was a different time, and a different mindset. Some of its predictions were true, others proved as vacuous as the idea that we'd all be in flying cars and living on the moon by the year 2000.

Post-cyberpunk is a more organic, yet equally fantastic and high-tech, vision of the future. There's still cyberware, because in the end metal just plain outperforms meat in certain fields. There is more emphasis on bioware, on genetech, and on nanotech. That this evolution, in Shadowrun, occurs simultaneous to the presence of magic, grants Shadowrun the opportunity that no other game has, insofar as evolving into a unique and intriguing Awakened post-Cyberpunk world. When I'm not attempting to get certain existing rules ratified for sanity's sake, I'm working on ideas along this thread. I'll probably continue attempting to submit my ideas for Magenics as opportunity arises. I think Shadowrun, like all other things, should be an evolving work-in-progress. Fantasy is eternal, based on cultural myth more than current culture, so D&D, while stable, is also less capable of any form of novel evolution. Shadowrun, on the other hand, has great evolutionary opportunity.

But that's just my opinion. I think it's a pretty solid one, but in the end it's most important that a game evolve in tune with the beliefs of its players, more than the beliefs of one crackpot writer, or one freelancer, or one production line manager.

[3278]

[Paul]

[Demonseed Elite]

[mfb]

[Wireknight]

Heh, it's the post-Cyberpunk theme and ideas, not the actual world, that I found inspiring in Transmet. I don't think anyone capable of making an RPG that simulated the world of Transmetropolitan would also be capable of being allowed to wander about unmedicated and unrestrained.

[mfb]

they let neal stephenson roam the streets...

[Cynic project]

Tell ya what you get bioware that you can make in a day,and then have it be stable,I will then say cyberware is gone.

But the facts simple, that once you get the resources to build cyberware, you can do so at speed and in numbers. Bioware on the other hand well.

Now as for a little trick, we live in a world with less care about other people. We live in areas where we do not know who lives next to us, or care what happens down the street. We live in a world where tens of people are killed each day. We do not blink. Yet we spend months of our times when a rich black guy, or some random white guy kills his wife? We live in a world that will have you pay for the honor of being a walking add and have you think it is cool.

[Wireknight]

[Req]

Just so long as he shuts the hell up about what goddamn operating system he uses, I'll be fine with him. The man writes sometimes great, and sometimes bad, but I just don't buy the DIVINE UR-GEEK image he tosses around.

Seems like everyone else in Seattle does, though. :(

[Guest_Crimsondude 2.0_*]

One of the interesting things about having moved away from cyberpunk is that the idea of overcrowded cities is just so alien in the U.S. Everyone wants to move to the suburbs or exurbs or whatever some NYTimes columnists decrees them to be called this week.

Whereas all but one or two of the cities which have populations above 10 million are in the developing world, and urbanization reflects significant cultural shifts in Asia (all of Asia) and Africa--indeed, in the same way as cities like New York grew to thir current size.

But, sshh... Don't tell Gibson. He'll take that and fuck it all up.

[Pistons]

[Paul]

I'm going to read that as busty and be happier for i. :wink:

Seriously though, thanks for the reccomendations. I am clickying now!

[Demonseed Elite]

Yeah, Warren Ellis is the man. I have secret dreams that Captain Chaos is replaced by Spider Jerusalem for the next SR book. :grinbig:

Don't get me wrong, I love Shadowrun, but if I go from reading my Transmet collection to reading a Shadowrun book, SR seems so dry and sterile and clean in comparison. I wish it were dirtier and more psychotic like Transmet.

[Demosthenes]

That's why DocWagon runs Bastard Farms IMG, rather than those nice, clean, almost-morally-neutral clone-y tank things...

Does anyone else think of Damien Knight as The Smiler, or is it just me?

We need a three-eyed smilie...
:silly:

[DrJest]

Lots to read, some to comment on :)

[Demonseed Elite]

[mfb]

[Birdy]

[DrJest]

Time to switch to decaff, mate :wobble:

[Paul]

[mfb]

that's never been a strong theme in SR, though, Birdy. except for the neo-A books, most SR material recognizes that runners and corporations are symbiotic.

[DrJest]

Yeah, what's that quote? Something like "Funny how our employers, nemeses and reasons for existing are all the same"

[Demonseed Elite]

On SURGE, I can tell you straight up that the writers had very little say where that was going. SURGE was Mike's; he gave us the YotC outline (which I still have) that basically had SURGE done minus the "if any of the freelancers have ideas for more SURGE expressions, propose 'em." I argued against SURGE, I didn't like it. I wasn't the only one. But it was going in. And really, that was Mike's perogative as line designer, whether we liked it or not. As writers, we could write or walk. I actually walked (not solely because of YotC, but a collection of issues). My work in SoNA was my last work for Shadowrun for awhile, until I saw that under Rob, evident from books which I'd not been involved in (SSG, SoE, SOTA63 and SOTA64), things were really very different. The whole process is very different now. It's not perfect, but I'm much more optimistic, and I'm enjoying myself a lot more. I'm glad I came back.

That said, SURGE isn't all about anime and furry stuff. I mean, pick up Transmetropolitan. It's full of freaks. It's not anime. That's another way of looking at SURGE. I mainly didn't like the "magical random expression" aspect of it. I much prefer a Shadowrun where people make themselves into freaks. By choice.

Paul, are you saying Aztlan should just be a place that is misunderstood, or is that perception now the problem?

[Paul]

[hobgoblin]

one either mutates with the cultural fads of the times or one becomes stale. yes one may not like furry or anime style but i fail to see how anything other then the art (and anime style art is showing up in anything, even classic comic lines from marvel and dc comics) of shadowrun pushes the anime way.

if you look away from the pokemon, sailor moon and dragonball z wave you will see that there is many anime out there that have serious themes. ghost in the shell had the classical cyberpunk question of where man stops and machine beings embedded at its core. anime isnt a synonym for over the top fireballs and other explosions. thats only one type of storytelling, just like actions are only one kind of movie.

but actions are simpler to translate and sell as you dont have to think as much. and cartoons and comics are in the west normaly seens as a child to teen thing. therefor the anime that gets translated are the ones that seems to fit that segmet, adding even more weight to the idea/image.

welcome to the globalised world, while you may export mcdonalds, you risk importing something else :P

[Demonseed Elite]

[Critias]

[hobgoblin]

[Jrayjoker]

I think that SR is flexible enough to encompass all the viewpoints that have been expresses here. The overall tone of the (little g) game is completely dependant on the GM and players that are sitting around the table, and that tone will be different at every table you choose to look at. That is the best thing about the Shadowrun universe that the developers (past and present) have created.

I am going to be running a new campaign after a 5+ year hiatus where we played That Other Game and I plan on starting out fairly local and working in the world spanning conspiracies as we play. The characters are going to encounter everything from street urchins to GDs and IEs before the campaign is done, and they are going to know that 99.999% of the time they don't really know what the hell is going on. But hey, that is just my game....

In the end, we will all play the game we want to play, and hopefully we will have players who agree with our assessment if we are GMs, or GMs who ask us what we want out of the world if we are players.

Now, that being said, I hate surge on a gut level, no reason whatsoever. I don't want it in my game, so it isn't.

I like the path that adepts are being developed on. As mana levels rise with the cycle there will be more people in touch with it, and their expressions are going to be as individual as they are.

Cyber doesn't have to be exclusive to mundanes, but it will help them keep up with the adepts when the mana levels are higher.

Standard cyberware's essence costs needs to be dropped to what alphaware is at right now, and should continue to drop every couple years, and the nuyen cost should drop along with the essence cost IMO.

And finally, the shift from cyberpunk to slipstream is fine by me. Like I said before, I can't keep my angst levels up high enough to make CP worth my while...

[Mumbles]

My favorite Shadowrun Sourcebooks are all still second edition sourcebooks. Cybertechnology, Field's of Fire, Awakenings all had great atmosphere. I agree with one of the earlier posters in this thread that mentioned Hatchetman's story from Cybertechnology. His description of the dehumanizing effects of Cyber just feels right to me.

I was unhappy about the direction the game was taking for a long time in the latter part of the FASA days. SURGE in particular was a low point for me. My gaming group pretty much diverged from the Canon Shadowrun universe around that time, though we are incorporating elements for some of the more recent releases.

I am encouraged with the direction the game is taking now though. I like how the universe is not stagnant, that things change, society changes. Making the MegaCorps a bit less faceless makes sense. They can still be the somewhat evil entities that they've always been, but they aren't stupid, and know the value of good public relations. In the game world I play in there are other companies that aren't morally much better than Aztechnology, they just are better at disguising their motivations and actions.

I also like that the state of the art is changing for technology and magic, causing some older characters problems as they find that their abilities aren't as good as they used to be. This reflects the real world quite well, IMO. The introduction of new ideas and technology will always leave some people left out in the cold. Fear of obsolesence should be common among older Shadowrunners.

Over time, I think the monetary and essence cost of Cyberware should slowly fall, and more magical techniques should come available. Cyberware and magic should slowly become more and more common among the general population as itechnology becomes cheaper and the Mana level rises.

[Guest_Crimsondude 2.0_*]

[Demonseed Elite]

Yeah, I personally always liked to see Dunkelzahn as just a damn good politician. But the Dragonheart Trilogy ruined all that. Damn you, Dragonheart, damn you! :|

[Birdy]

[Guest_Crimsondude 2.0_*]

[Demonseed Elite]

I have my own views about that, but it's stuff I can't really go into in detail yet! ;)

But the Dragonheart Trilogy really did drive a knife into the gut of my theories. Unless it's written off as all part of the lies.

[Synner]

[DrJest]

I have no trouble with Dunkelzahn and Harlequin being genuine heroes. Why? Two words: Bell Curve.

Run the bell curve from Archvillain to Superhero. On the right, there's Big D and the Laughing Man. On the left, Horrors and probably Aztech (in my Second Scourge campaign Aztech were directly responsible for the early rise of the Horrors, but I digress). The vast majority of people, and particularly shadowrunners, fall somewhere in the middle.

Now, I think it's important that we have Big D and co. I also think it's important that we have Horrors etc. Because they define the bell curve.

Sequeing into my own game world, this is important from a "finding your place" point of view. I run a more heroic game, you see, and having almost sterotypical heroes and villains defines the middle ground. On the one hand you can look up to the heroes as something to admire and aspire to; on the other you can look down on the villains as something to fear and despise.

Will the PC's ever be global heroes like Dunkelzahn? Unlikely. Should they strive to be? Hell yes! Mankind's finest moments come from the struggle for betterment, whether that be fighting to preserve your ideals or simply overcoming the obstacles in your daily life. Shadowrun presents a canvas on which you can paint, if you choose, a truly legendary picture.

Rise above the petty. Become the heroes you always secretly knew yourselves to be.

[Guest_Crimsondude 2.0_*]

[mfb]

psh. my characters are in this for the money.

[hobgoblin]

[Cynic project]

I don't think people are evil, so much as they do not see eye to eye,or they just don't care.

I loved it when Aztlan had blood mages roaming around. The CEO and board members didn't care. It wasn't that Aztlan was saying we are evil,and we will go send this world into hell. IT was that they didn't care what happened to the world. They lived in their own world, just like most truly wealthy people do. THey left the blood mages alone, because they were making money or at least not costing them money. If something is cheaper for a corp, the corp will do it that way. If it so happens that it is cheaper to let people die, than sending out a recall. No recall is sent and people die.

[Paul]

Evil, like all morality is subjective. It requires a value judgement that can not be defined universally.

[Patrick Goodman]

[Guest_Crimsondude 2.0_*]

[Paul]

Skinner? That's with out the benefit of Google.

[Paul]

[Guest_Crimsondude 2.0_*]

[Cynic project]

[DrJest]

[MYST1C]

[Pistons]

[Patrick Goodman]

[Patrick Goodman]

[Jrayjoker]

I sense some sarcasm in that last post.

[Patrick Goodman]

[Req]

[mfb]

no way. using Horrors to define SR's evil makes everything black and white. bleagh.