Africa? Options

[Negalith]

Are there are good refrences for what shadowrun Africa is like?

[TheOOB]

There is a section on cape town in runners companion, which is at the southern tip of africa.

[Hagga]

Runner Haven's does a good job of showing some of the southern areas.

[bofh]

There's some background info in Nosferatu (novel). Just finished reading it.

Carl

[Warlordtheft]

Cyberpirates covers the Ivory and gold coast as well as an interesting piece on Madagascar (FASA#7124 circa 1997),

Target awakened lands covers some sites in Africa as well(Fanpro#10651 circa 2001).

As well as tid bits in other books, paticularly the Europe book touches on the med and north Africa (desert wars, Libya is no longer on the Label!!, Thanks Isreal!!)

[Jaid]

the lagos chapter of feral cities gives a pretty decent concept of what the surrounding areas are like. i would recommend it if the cost is within your gaming budget.

[Lance]

If you really want to run in Africa AND dont want to make up everything yourself (which could be fun as well) and even then, you need the following:

Feral Cities (highest priority, as it provides background for the major city and its surroundings AND provides plenty of hints at the state of Africa alltogether)
Runner Havens (Capetown)
Cyberpirates (Pirate Coast in Western Africa)
Target Wastelands (Deserts)

One of my favourite runs was set in Africa, before I had any of these books. I used todays conditions, made them worse, added some SR flavour and voilà, Africa of the 6th world.

One of the advantages of this setting seems to be, that you have a lot of room to play with and can have large scale action scenes, without ruining your adventures. (that's one of the reasons we never play in Seattle... I always feel locked up, when I imagine GMing Seattle)

[GreyBrother]

Hmmm it's darn sad that there isn't a Shadows over Africa or stuff. Egypt would be really interesting.

[hermit]

A lot of the info on Cape Town is actually to be found in the out of print novel Nosferatu 2055.

[ThreeGee]

Egypt would be really interesting.

I'm pretty sure Egypts been mentioned at least once. Maybe in Year of the Comet? I seem to remember something about widespread physical transformations in the populace.

[hermit]

It featured, I think, in Target: Awakened Lands, a bit in Loose Alliances, Shadows of Asia, and Target: Smuggler havens. Again, if I'm not mistaken.

[The Jake]

If you really want to run in Africa AND dont want to make up everything yourself (which could be fun as well) and even then, you need the following:

Feral Cities (highest priority, as it provides background for the major city and its surroundings AND provides plenty of hints at the state of Africa alltogether)
Runner Havens (Capetown)
Cyberpirates (Pirate Coast in Western Africa)
Target Wastelands (Deserts)

One of my favourite runs was set in Africa, before I had any of these books. I used todays conditions, made them worse, added some SR flavour and voilà, Africa of the 6th world.

One of the advantages of this setting seems to be, that you have a lot of room to play with and can have large scale action scenes, without ruining your adventures. (that's one of the reasons we never play in Seattle... I always feel locked up, when I imagine GMing Seattle)

This REALLY shits me.

Azania (and Amazonia for that matter) are two settings in Shadowrun that have been TOUCHED ON but NEVER DETAILED. The brief writeup on Capte Town in Runner Havens doesn't cut the mustard. We've been waiting on this for nearly 20 years and what we get are bits and pieces, scattered between 5 books (counting novels) to get enough information and to do that, you have to be following the game for many years to learn that much. I have been hoping and praying for every world/location book to expand on these two countries. Everytime I've been disappointed.

A skilled GM could improvise if these places were unchanged by SR authors have done so much remodelling that they are barely recognisable when compared to their contemporary counterparts.

We deserve a LOT more than that on these two countries. They've been largely ignored and deserve a MUCH more detailed writeup.

I sincerely hope there is a plan to rectify this situation.

- J.

[Warlordtheft]

This REALLY shits me.

Azania (and Amazonia for that matter) are two settings in Shadowrun that have been TOUCHED ON but NEVER DETAILED. The brief writeup on Capte Town in Runner Havens doesn't cut the mustard. We've been waiting on this for nearly 20 years and what we get are bits and pieces, scattered between 5 books (counting novels) to get enough information and to do that, you have to be following the game for many years to learn that much. I have been hoping and praying for every world/location book to expand on these two countries. Everytime I've been disappointed.

A skilled GM could improvise if these places were unchanged by SR authors have done so much remodelling that they are barely recognisable when compared to their contemporary counterparts.

We deserve a LOT more than that on these two countries. They've been largely ignored and deserve a MUCH more detailed writeup.

I sincerely hope there is a plan to rectify this situation.

- J.

Asmondo should also be in that book. A target awakened lands II perhaps?

[Snow_Fox]

Target Awakened Lands gives some stuff in passing on Egypt. Some of the books reference an elven nation or an elven Zulu nation which would put it on the south eastern coast, northern South Africa, southern Zimbabwe.

There was also a reference to a ghoul nation.

[Hagga]

Asamando, and the Queen Ghoul. RC has a variant ghoul with +1 reach that comes from there, also runs on all fours. They've got a lot of diamonds and gold, which the Queen, who is essentially a dictator, negotiates with DeBeers Omnitech and a biotech company for moneys.

[hermit]

I don't get why noone has yet nuked the ghouls out of existence. The explanation with fear of becoming ghoul chow really means nothing against an aerial effort to smash any larger settlement with aerosol bombs; the remaining ghouls could easily be mopped up with combat drones. Noone must fear to be gradually eaten then. All damn ghoulies are dead. Everyone wins (except the infected, but they shouldn't anyway).

[Snow_Fox]

Because if ares Macrotechnologies used its tech to destroy all the ghouls world wide, like they did in Chicago, then there would be no more ghouls.
No more ghouls means no more income from selling smaller batches of the anti-ghoul tech.

[hermit]

Who says it has to be Ares? Ares isn't the only force with some military assets around. Aztech, for instance, combines military might, willingness for genocide and no interest in pest fighting services (they prefer to have the jungle and strip mines for themselves, since that's more like their core business).

[Jaid]

because the ghouls in asamando are filthy stinking rich, and can shoot down aircraft just like anyone else, and can hide in bunkers, etc, while their anti-air guns (which are likely a great deal cheaper than your aircraft) do all the work.

you can't take land with an airforce, either. germany bombed england like crazy for quite a while in WWII, but never took it over, because in order to do that you have to land somewhere and control the ground from the ground. so nonsense like "oh, they can just destroy them from the air" is just that; nonsense.

[Red_Cap]

Germany didn't have genetically engineered bioweapons at their disposal, though. I'm sure that most of the megas' R&D sections could (or already have) whipped up some sort of virus or bacteria that attacks only HMHVV carriers.

In point of fact, I smell an idea for a run coming up. . .

[hermit]

because the ghouls in asamando are filthy stinking rich, and can shoot down aircraft just like anyone else, and can hide in bunkers, etc, while their anti-air guns (which are likely a great deal cheaper than your aircraft) do all the work.

That will really help them survive aerosol bombs dropped by high-flying bombers. And how exactly will they operate these AA sytsems, except as drones? They're BLIND. And astral sight isn't too good at making out machines in great distances. Also, you could just drop FAB 3 there, if you were really militant.

you can't take land with an airforce, either.

I'm not talking about subduing, I'm talking about extermination. And hitting the population centers would only be the first step. Then, you'd mop up the rest with magic, spirits, and drones. All of which any decent army has by now. Likely, many neighbouring countries would gladly donate spirits to that cause, either if you promise them a cut of the mines, or because they really dislike being eaten.

germany bombed england like crazy for quite a while in WWII

While I agree with you, that was nothing against the air wars of today.

[Damage]

Nairobi, Kenya, has a small section in the Corporate Enclaves book.

[hermit]

Good point, thanks.

[Warlordtheft]

Who says it has to be Ares? Ares isn't the only force with some military assets around. Aztech, for instance, combines military might, willingness for genocide and no interest in pest fighting services (they prefer to have the jungle and strip mines for themselves, since that's more like their core business).

The Corps that have business relations with them.that is the reason they aren't blasted off the map. I mean the more mindless gouls make great day laborerers. They also work cheap (for food).

[hermit]

I refuse to see where mindless ghouls do make good labourers, except maybe clobbering stones in strip mines. They're BLIND, so most sweat shop work is out for them (and having HMHVV all over your products won't be good for sales either, I think).

And why pay them when you can just bomb them flat, take their stuff, pay nothing anymore AND have a good PR boost, at least with the locals?