Petition to Catalyst: Return to the Shadowland BBS format, Shadowtalk = good. No shadowtalk = bad. Options

[Tanegar]

I just got back from my FLGS, where I picked up a copy of Fields of Fire (yeah, yeah, behind the times, etc). Reading it made me realize that my favorite Shadowrun sourcebooks are the ones presented as posts on the Shadowland BBS: Tír na nÓg, Cybertechnology, Bug City, and now Fields of Fire. Personal accounts of life in the Sixth World, especially life as a runner or other operative make the books more fun, interesting, and useful. Matador's rundown of the merc mindset in the "Mercenary Operations" and "Basic Operations" sections of Fields of Fire offered more insight into the mind of a professional operative than any other SR book I have ever read.

Rulebooks in the format of Street Magic and Arsenal are interesting in a mechanical way; they give me ideas for what I want my character to do. Shadowland-style books are interesting from both a mechanical and a role-playing perspective; they give me ideas for who I want my character to be. I humbly submit that both of these are equally important in Shadowrun, and therefore Catalyst should return to the Shadowland format for all future Shadowrun sourcebooks.

Sign the petition. You know you want to.

[Ancient History]

Dude, what the hell? Street Magic and Arsenal (and Unwired[i], [i]Augmentation, Runner's Companion...) are chock full of shadowtalk. Oodles more than their third edition counterparts. You're not going to see the return of gun porn, if that's what you're asking for.

[Veggiesama]

I like how the rulebooks handle it now. The fluffy background material is generally handled at the beginning of the chapter while the crunchy bits come at the end. The first few chapters of the rulebooks are mostly fluff, often with a layman's-eye-view of what's going on.

I think the rule-books are interesting from both a mechanical and roleplaying way. I tend to skip through the mechanics if I'm not interested in the archetype it caters to, but if I'm making a character, then I focus on those mechanics.

I like balance. With all fluff, it's difficult to directly incorporate something into a game (ex. a setting or adventure with no stat blocks for enemies, no calls for Perception tests, no maps for gameplay). With all mechanics, it can be dry and boring to read (I'm looking at you, D&D 4e).

[hobgoblin]

Unwired is BBS style. and so is augmentation and runners companion. Or at least the fluff parts of the chapter are.

Thing is that two of the books you present as examples are setting books, iirc.

And the other two are from the early days, when there was less rules to bring up to date with the current edition.

Both allow the writers to put "padding" into the pages...

Drat, double ninja'd...

[eidolon]

Yeah, gotta agree with other posters. If you think the current line is lacking in fluff, you might want to read through it again.

Don't think I'm just disagreeing to disagree. I love the old formats and books. My favorite Shadowrun book of all time is probably Cybertechnology, and I have both versions of the Street Samurai Catalog for Pete's sake.

But the new books are loaded with awesome RP material, setting material, etc., too. It's just slightly different looking.

[Ayeohx]

I know what he's talking about. Its why I disliked 3rd edition so much. And as much as I liked that format its just not practical. Each piece of gear had its own page with a few comments by runners talking about it. Today, we can't do that. We'd lose a lot of material. I feel that the developers currently in charge have found a great middle ground. We get a lot of material plus runner chat on the important subjects. Yes, I loved the witty comment about how a particular weapon could flatten light ammo against body armor faster than ever before but it just not feasible anymore.

Also, from an in character standpoint I'd rather have everyone shut their pie holes so we can get on to the good stuff. Show me the gear!

[BlueMax]

Dude, what the hell? Street Magic and Arsenal (and Unwired[i], [i]Augmentation, Runner's Companion...) are chock full of shadowtalk. Oodles more than their third edition counterparts. You're not going to see the return of gun porn, if that's what you're asking for.

The last sentence, why is it so definite? Not that I need gun porn, I prefer redheaded females. I ask because the tone approaches market defiance. If the people want to shell out cash for gun porn, I advise you...


Go.... On Take the money and run.

[hobgoblin]

Don't think I'm just disagreeing to disagree. I love the old formats and books. My favorite Shadowrun book of all time is probably Cybertechnology, and I have both versions of the Street Samurai Catalog for Pete's sake.

I got a sweet spot for virtual realities 2.0...

Only partially for the shadowtalk tho, as the almost overly detailed deck building rules are just fun to poke at. I would love to see optical cpus that one could burn at home.

But both the opening exchange of shadowtalk, and the matrix newbie chapter, where the seasoned decker gather to poke fun at a matrix learning terminal, are nice reads. The first one for its "two elders" overheard mutterings kind of feel, the second for its very relaxed atmosphere...

[Ancient History]

The last sentence, why is it so definite? Not that I need gun porn, I prefer redheaded females.

Damn. So close.

I ask because the tone approaches market defiance. If the people want to shell out cash for gun porn

They are SOL. The old format of one-weapon per page (gun porn), one-critter per page (critter porn), one vehicle per page (carporn) - is nearly gone from RPGs. You can squeeze more content into fewer pages by going without the huge illustrations and spacing that gun porn entails. Keep in mind: me lowly freelancer making a statement, not big bad developer. I don't design the books, I just write 'em.

[CanRay]

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm... Gun Porn... (IMG:style_emoticons/default/love.gif)

That said, there's still lots of Shadowtalk, just less Shadowtalkers, so you know who is actually saying something!

[Dhaise]

I prefer the new format (post 4th), and the old shadowtalk (say...the corporate shadowfiles era and earlier).

The old shadowtalk seemed less forced, you had people commenting on stuff they didn't know anything about (the laymen), relative experts in their particular fields (chromed accountant,the smiling bandit) and the occasional easter egg from fiction(renny). In 4th, we get a bunch of the same faces always talking on the same level. Smiling Bandit is no longer just the bio-guy, he's the big kahuna on anything science related. Fastjack always has to appear and let everybody know he's old-yet powerful. You can't shake a stick without Harlequin popping up. Gone are the days of squabbling crossposters like the Ares company man and the anti-ares runner insisting his dad was killed for the mp laser whenever the topic came up,but individually still had insight on other areas. Or Lone Gunman coming up with bizarre conspiracy theories so often that when he actually gets one right, he's laughed at (threats). Or being unable to read a single post about MCT without someone bringing up yak ties'. It seems like a smaller pool of characters, and the same voices used repeatedly. Half the fun of reading the old fluff was that the shadowtalkers from one particular argument weren't automatically going to be the next guys dominating the next 4 sourcebooks. Now it's pretty much the same guys with the same roles each conversation and it started along this trend (IMO) with the inclusion of the Otaku. In ye old days, the big name deckers had better things to do then comment on the latest gun catalog, so when Dodger or Fastjack jumped into something for a minute in a throwaway line,it suddenly became a big deal. Now fastjack reminds me of an aging hipster trying to convince the young crowd that he's still cool. Not that the old stuff didn't have it's flaws (because that fastjack otaku battle that wasted about 1/4 page of a book was pretty annoying and boring- even fiction and fluff relating to the old matrix was mostly boring), but the voices were all so contradictory that it was easier to cherry pick which was appropriate for a particular campaign.
The new stuff is more thematically focused and in a lot of cases, better written, but the old style felt more like a living,breathing world with more avenues to accomodate relevant fluff into a gm. Ultimately,it's just fluff though, and wouldn't alter my purchase of an interesting supplement one way or the other. And the 4th+ crew are definately doing something right with their writing,because I'm buying everything as it comes out-with the earlier editions I generally waited a while for a sale. There were a lot of 1st and 2nd books that I read and enjoyed,but could never incorporate into a campaign. Tir Na Nog was a great read,with a lot of color-but not a book that was particularly useful in 95% of my games. I like the current balance of creativity and utility.

[Tanegar]

I like the gun porn! Maybe it's a personal quirk, but I like to see what the stuff my character is using looks like. It helps my imaginative process enormously.

[BlueMax]

Damn. So close.


They are SOL. The old format of one-weapon per page (gun porn), one-critter per page (critter porn), one vehicle per page (carporn) - is nearly gone from RPGs. You can squeeze more content into fewer pages by going without the huge illustrations and spacing that gun porn entails. Keep in mind: me lowly freelancer making a statement, not big bad developer. I don't design the books, I just write 'em.

Please understand, besides wanting redheads, I would also like to see Catalyst make more mo-nay.

If you are a redheaded male, breed! The future needs your genetics.

BlueMax
/married a Redhead
//got a blond and a dirty blond for children.
/// guess I didn't even have the gene hiding in the background
//// At least the youngest is a spike dwarf, so I got some hidden genes

[Tiger Eyes]

I prefer the new format (post 4th), and the old shadowtalk (say...the corporate shadowfiles era and earlier).

You can't shake a stick without Harlequin popping up.

Whaa... ? Harley is definately not one of our shadowtalkers. We have around 70 of them, and he's not on the list. Also, for each book, special guests are invited. KAM, for example (invited in by the Smiling Bandit... think they've got something going there?).

I'd like to point out that every book produced in SR4 has had shadowtalk and at least one section written from one of our core Jackpoint posters (even SR4A - the history section is written by Fastjack). Rules books have several in-character posts by the JackPointers. Street Magic, for example, has The Awakened World (posted by Winterhawk & Fatima), Magical Goods (posted by Winterhawk, Lyran, & Ethernaut) & Spirits (posted by Ethernaut). Yes, it is a rules book, but it still has "fiction" to ground the rules in the setting, complete with shadowtalk.

I'm really not sure what the OP means about 'bringing back shadowtalk... it's there. It's all over the place. Every rule book printed has shadowtalk. The location books are 95% in-character postings, complete with Shadowtalk. Emergence, Ghost Cartels - both full of shadowtalk and in-character postings (heck, could you get more in character than the first chapter of Ghost Cartels?).

We're actively moving away from "random posts" to a core group of shadowtalkers (JackPoint is a closed network). And yes, we're working on developing them; their lives, their relationships, their jobs, their areas of expertise. Some are newbies, like Beaker. Some are old-timers and experts--Smiling Bandit. Old favorites will make guest appearances in books as special experts...

[hobgoblin]

I think one potential problem was that over time each writer introduced new names with poorly documented personalities and agendas, making it hard to use most of them in other contexts.

Worse was the risk that two people would use the same nickname but write them wildly different, resulting in all kinds of wtf moments for the reader.

[Dhaise]

Whaa... ? Harley is definately not one of our shadowtalkers. We have around 70 of them, and he's not on the list. Also, for each book, special guests are invited. KAM, for example (invited in by the Smiling Bandit... think they've got something going there?).

Now that I think of it,it isn't so much 'you guys' really as the last days of 'fasa/early fanpro' era. For a while, 'the laughing man' was tossed in anywhere and everywhere he could be.

[Demonseed Elite]

Now that I think of it,it isn't so much 'you guys' really as the last days of 'fasa/early fanpro' era. For a while, 'the laughing man' was tossed in anywhere and everywhere he could be.

Well, yeah, that was a wild and chaotic time. I remember writing a chapter and having to physically flip through other books for all of the random shadowtalk posters I'd use to make sure I wasn't using them in the wrong context. It was a time consuming and frustrating process. There was even an effort to build an Excel spreadsheet of all the shadowtalk posters in 3rd Edition, but it was like swimming upstream.

[BlueMax]

I think one potential problem was that over time each writer introduced new names with poorly documented personalities and agendas, making it hard to use most of them in other contexts.

Worse was the risk that two people would use the same nickname but write them wildly different, resulting in all kinds of wtf moments for the reader.

Problem? I considered this a benefit. Random folks with random quotes gave me more of a world feel. To each his own but sometimes I don't want to know.

Is there no mystery or romance left in life?

[hobgoblin]

thing is this, shadowland was supposedly a place of the few. but as time passed, it seems to attract people from just about any walk of life.

basically, it became less the small quiet place down some back street, and more like the virtual starbucks of seattle, where dragons rubbed shoulders with plumbers...

[BlueMax]

thing is this, shadowland was supposedly a place of the few. but as time passed, it seems to attract people from just about any walk of life.

basically, it became less the small quiet place down some back street, and more like the virtual starbucks of seattle, where dragons rubbed shoulders with plumbers...

If he is a drek hot plumber, and works well in the shadows, it works for me.

My one third ed game had a plumber, I kid you not.

BlueMax
/Seattle Health Inspection Team
// Had the dayjob thing too..

[Demonseed Elite]

Yeah, once great dragons and immortal elves started posting to the Shadowland BBS, it lost a lot of credibility as an underground bulletin board.

[Larme]

I honestly skip the shadowtalk. I find that it gets annoying sometimes, and if all you read is the shadowtalk, you're left with conflicting information and little if any picture of who it comes from or why you should care what they think. My favorite fiction in the rulebooks is the stories at the beginnings of chapters, because that's where the writers have a chance to build up atmosphere and outline all the awesome features of the various characters they create. Not that I read much of that either, but that's largely a factor of time. My point is, I get enough jabber from anonymous weirdos on Dumpshock. I prefer my fictional characters to be fleshed out without my having to go and buy a novel about them.

[kzt]

I like the gun porn! Maybe it's a personal quirk, but I like to see what the stuff my character is using looks like. It helps my imaginative process enormously.

If the artists or the person who selected the artwork had more than a vague idea about weapons it would help... I find the artwork detracts as it is usually so awful.

[Necro Sanct]

I personally would rather see CthulhuTech style rumor blocks. Sometimes the shadowtalk is right in the middle of a section while not standing boldly apart from it. To me that usually breaks the focus of what a book/section is supposed to be about. In CT the rumors are nicely sperated from the rules and most times, if not always, at the end of the appropriate section. The main seperation of the two styles in delivery is one of specific vs. general. As noted by some others the specific tends to lead to situations of not being consistant across the product line. CT on the other hand seems to avoid that by keeping the faces in the shadows.

Now there are ways to avoid mixing things up on the Shadowrun front. Sticking to a specific list of Prime Shadowrunners, moving to a rumors (shadowtalk) block style similar to CT, and possibly a few more. I would have to start up InDesign and a few other programs to do some mock-ups to determine what methods would work best while still staying within the Shadowrun framework. If I had to pick either of them off the top of my head to win a style award based on this topic alone, I would have to go with CthulhuTech. Sometimes less is more.

As an example here is the breakdown of shadowtalk from Rotten Apple.
Axis Mundi: 13
2XL: 8
Aufheben: 6
Baka Dabora: 1
Butch: 1
Clockwork: 1
Cosmo: 6
DangerSensei: 4
Dr. Spin: 4
Elijah: 1
FastJack: 1 (not counting JackPoint section)
Fianchetto: 1
Frosty: 2
Glitch: 5
Hannibelle: 1
Hard Exit: 3
Haze: 1
Kane: 1
Kat o’ Nine Tales: 3
Kay St. Irregular: 2
Kia: 1
Lyran: 1
Ma’Fan: 2
Marcos: 2
Mika: 4
Mr. Bonds: 5
Nephrine: 1
Netcat: 4
Picador: 2
Pistons: 10
Plan 9: 6
Red Anya: 1
Slamm-O!: 6
Snopes: 2
Sticks: 2
Stone: 3
Sunshine: 5
Traveler Jones: 5

Cast Total: 38
Shadowtalk Total: 133 (3.5 average)

Move the 13 single entry cast to the other 25 (5.3 average).
Condense the 7 double entry cast down to 18 (7.3 average).
This could go on until we have 10 cast (13.3 average).
Once again we see the less is more aspect arising.This would also have an extra option of the author being able to flesh those 10 select cast out and include them in a section of the book itself. Another option could be to make them available in a who's who section on the website.

[Cardul]

Officially, I list Fatima(rest in Peace), Kat o' Nine Tales, Netcat, Smiling Bandit, Fastjack, and Picador as my favourite Jackpointers, though I will admit that I do miss some of the old faces from Shadowland, like Neon Samurai and Hatchetman(rest in peace).

For me, the Shadowtalk we have in the newer books is more useful, though I do miss the rumours we used to have in the old days. Gyromount Stabilizer Harness in Street Samurai's Catalog, and Enhanced Articulation in Shadowtech spring to mind.