jack point is awefully small Options

[mfb]

paging through Runner Havens, it does seem like there are a number of one-shot commenters. at least, there are names (Ishikawa is the one that springs to mind, for obvious reasons) that i don't recall being on The List.

[SL James]

[Slithery D]

Close; the crazy is a few inches behind your eye.

The SR3 regulars are boring shades on the same infodumping pattern. There were a few one time exceptions, like The Gingerbread Man in Cyberpirates. But he was a one book wonder. Older regulars like Bung, Argent, Hangfire, Hatchetman, etc. all had different levels of humor, background, and professionalism that made them distinct. I'd like to add the Smiling Bandit to that list, but he was really another one book wonder.

There are three reasons for this degradation. The big one is more people using them, which seriously hampers the ability to draw consistent character without brutal and heavy handed editing. The second reason is that such editing wouldn't be practical - it's not really easy to read a couple of dozen past sourcebooks solely to get the right feel of past characters and then repeat that in future installments. And the third problem is that even the regulars are used too sparingly. There is far less back and forth discussion/argument between a given set of characters, both on a single page and throughout a book. Now we get drive by opinions that sum up an opinion and just leave it there like a flaming bag on your doorstep.

[mintcar]

It had it's ups and downs, but to be fair; so did the SR2 shadowtalk. I kinda liked some of the commentary in Sprawl Survival Guide, for example. Cyberpirates was another shining example, which you allready brought up. On the other hand I can't remember much of the commentary in most recent books. I agree that the quality of shadowtalk in general went downwards during the SR3 times, were books were becoming more complex and political but at the same time a lot less commical to read. But I think the themes of the books are much to blame too. When they had a more lighthearted, lifestyle-based theme to work with they seem to have had an easier time to make the shadowtalk animated.

[Rotbart van Dain...]

One thing to keep in mind about Jackpoint:
It features a rating system.
Combined with a small, 'pro' group of members reduces the amount of desinformation in ST greatly.

[Critias]

DS features a rating system, too. That doesn't mean there's a small crowd doing all the posting.

[Rotbart van Dain...]

[mfb]

there are many boards that feature rating systems. they don't reduce the amount of BS that takes place, that i've seen. quite the contrary, a lot of times.

[eidolon]

Why would reducing the amount of "disinformation" in the fluff be a good thing? Half of what made it cool was that the GM could decide what was and wasn't true in his/her game. Granted, you can still do that, but if the shadowtalk is now limited to "canon gospel"...

[Rotbart van Dain...]

[FrankTrollman]

I'm not sure that it's all canon gospel even so. Street Magic has a reference to the Vatch - who are aliens from The Witches of Karres by James Schmitz. I doubt that they are explicitly part of the background.

[mfb]

i think the important aspect there is the limited membership, not the rating system. the limited membership is, itself, a rating system--if you're thought of highly enough to get a membership, any demerits you get are more likely to be the result of interpersonal conflicts than bad information/behavior on your part.

[fool]

I actually thought the shadow talk was better in much of sr3 than sr4 with the possible exception of the tir na nog book. Compare fof with dotsw or either of the sotas. Cyberpirates whil an excellent example was half 3+4. As far as having the posters have a consistent style, I don't think people always talk the same; it varies with topic and setting.
in runners havens there are certainly more on offs but less of the back and forth that created a back story to the book. And in SM there was virtually no back story. Now that's always been true with the core source books, but if you're going to add it in, jump in wiht both feet dammit.
I personally thought there were plenty of shadowtalkers who weremore than just cardboard cutouts. Picador, orange queen (any of the dragons really,) newyen nick, etc. how about the back story about Roxbourrough, in sota etc. You just don't get the flavour in the latest two books.

[mfb]

i think you mean SR2 and SR3, fool. at least, Cyberpirates was 2/3, not 3/4.

[fool]

yeah you're right.
BTW anyone got a clue how ds's rating system works?
Clearly JP's system involves peer reveiw. AM I being judged by some secret cabal on ds and how do I join that secret cabal?

[mfb]

DS's system is based purely on postcount.

[Mistwalker]

Sigh
I liked the secret cabal idea more than plain old post count

[fool]

I think I'm going to start posting a whole bunch of mundane trivial crap just to get my count up. :evil:

[Critias]

[Chandon]

So... why hasn't any crazed internet fan gone through all the books and come up with a public Shadowtalk database. I mean, if Idun Asmund gets her own Wikipedia page, I think that every single Shadowtalker deserves public and detailed web mention. :P

[Garrowolf]

I think that they should use our names as a sign of respect to the people who buy their products and pay their bills. ;)

[TW]

The set-up of Jack Point is different from the pre-crash Shadowland. It's by 'invitation-only'. That doesn't mean though that the member list will remain static, established members might drop out, get expelled, die or retire. As shown in Runner Havens, members might invite 'guests' to share some intel none of the Jack Point regulars knows about. On occasion, a guest might even receive full fledged member status after a while.

I agree with DE, flipping through the SR3 shadowtalker list and comparing the 'voice' of the regular and semi-regular Shadowland posters was a pain. Shadowtalk was great to view a topic from another (unconfirmed) angle but personally, not picking the right shadowtalker or picking the wrong 'tone' could ruin the whole post. One shots are fun, but at some point you would have to ask yourself just how 'oh-so-secret' SR3 Shadowland really was (and how some of the more annoying posters figured out how to log on in the first place).

By no means is the SR4 shadowtalker list easier for the freelancers to deal with. There are only some 60 shadowtalkers right now, but in every book the odd specialty topic™ comes up and needs to be addressed and/or discussed. In some cases, none of the Jack Pointers specialties come even close. Plus, we can't simply invite a guest for everything the regular members can't cover without stretching their areas of expertise too much. In some cases, it means rephrasing entire paragraphs or more, approaching the topic from a different angle, still delivering the important bits, but from a different source. Yep, that's our job, but it's still a pain in the ass.

Bringing back the old feel of 'hey, cool, Neon Samurai's back' or 'awww, poor Hatchetman' is easier when you have a steady cast to pick from. And keeping the list around 60 - 80 characters defintely helps a lot, both for the authors as well as for the audience. I think we did some nice stuff in Emergence (pre-editing, at least) that will show you where we're going with some of the chars....

Oh, and mentioning the occasional fellow Dumpshocker might still be possible, after all, there's the intro fiction Vignette in each chapter.... ;)

[MK Ultra]

[ChicagosFinest]

I liked the SR2 model when they had big rants at the end to sum up the big picture and keep you thinking about the larger, medium, or small meta-plots.

If your going to keep it consistant with characters Then have them be apart of intertwining plots so they actually face off aginst each other. I think thats one thing 2nd and 3rd did was the sacrifice consistancy for story. So when they introduced rivalries, and hatred for other characters it was not just because of their political views but because who they worked for and what they did. Hell Dunkie, his watchers, and special guests argued, threated and talked shit about each other all throughout the Atzlan post. It's that kind of flavor I want to keep.

So If the freelancers can do it more power to them. One thing that could keep it interesting is if someone posts the freelancers argue it out and then add in their comments so as a GROUP they all realize whats being said and make sure their message remains clear so that if a one shot gets in its peer edited so that the people who follow the story (all of us) can make the same conncetions as the insiders who write the material. THe point should be to share as much information as they know with us so I can get caught up to speed and try new and differant things with the information I got.

I guess in short what I'm trying to say is update me while telling a story and do what you need to do (one-shoot, shout-out, consistant characters, and local specialists) to get the job done.

[fool]

many of the most consistent voices that I'm thinking are missing are the likes of chromed accountant and nuyen nick, orange queen, dragonslayer (semi-regular,) picador/ matador, etc. Voices that were there consistently through multiple editions of the game.
As far as shadowland being not so secret, iirc they were written up as if you were good enough ot hack in you were good enough to be there (or you could be a contact) which made it a dangerous place to be talking about work too detailed.
All I'm saying is bring back my favorites dammit.