[X] My Assistant

[Method]

Still picking my way through it, but right off the bat I'll say:

Thank you guys for fixing the pdf issues.

Grabbed Spy Games and Way of the Adept and they both open beautifully in Apple Preview.

[Critias]

Now, Kansei and Austin are only marginally interesting but at least add some local hat to the settings. Berlin South here, with Lone Star; Ninja Samurai Corpers duking it out with Katanas there. Those settings will not win the cake but hey, they're okay. They even tell you why you might be interested in them, which is something that Bogota in War didn't manage in 50-odd pages. Improvement...

...Nairobi is nice to see a mention too, since Africa usually is mentioned only in an offhand way, dismissed as the home of hellhole feral places where people eat each other habitually and love ghouls...

...Tradecraft looks ok too. Loose Alliance level write-ups of agencies and the likes. I'll read that too, but tomorrow.

Glad you enjoyed those bits, or at least tolerated them.

A nitpick: It's the Yamato ideal, not the Yasuhito ideal.

Nitpick query: Where are you seeing Yamato? It's called the Yasuhito Ideal (all capitalized and everything) in 6WA. Yamato was the pro-segregation one, that encouraged Japanese xenophobia. The Yasuhito was the one that opened up the borders and trade more, softened (in theory) social norms towards metahumans, etc, etc.

[JM Hardy]

I apologize for the lack of info on clean car coating. Stats should be as follows:


Mod Slot Threshold Tools Cost Availability
CCC 0 8 shop Body x 50¥ 4

Jason H.

[CanRay]

I apologize for the lack of info on clean car coating. Stats should be as follows:


Mod Slot Threshold Tools Cost Availability
CCC 0 8 shop Body x 50¥ 4

Jason H.

So, when can we expect the errata for this to come out, Jason?

[hermit]

Nitpick query: Where are you seeing Yamato? It's called the Yasuhito Ideal (all capitalized and everything) in 6WA. Yamato was the pro-segregation one, that encouraged Japanese xenophobia. The Yasuhito was the one that opened up the borders and trade more, softened (in theory) social norms towards metahumans, etc, etc.

Then it was too late and I messed up. Withdrawn.

Glad you enjoyed those bits, or at least tolerated them.

Tolerated is a bit harshly put. Overall, it was like reading SoA or SoE. some parts were more interesting than others, but all were useful in case you ever wanted to take your campaign(s) there (unlikely in case of Austin and Kansei with me, but you never know), and none included a wtf moment.

[CanRay]

And we found out that the JackPoint can be hacked more than once.

And that FastJack's patience about "The Poster With No Name" is starting to wear thinner than his grey mohawk!

[hobgoblin]

Heh, we got another leonardo on our hands?!

Btw, i seem to have missed out on the first hack. What book was it in?

[hermit]

On with my possibly even complete this time review.

So. Thorn is the Brit/Tír Michael Westin of Shadowrun? He sure sounds the part in Tradecraft. Thorne's Top Tricks remind me of the voiceovers in Burn Notice - tone, topics covered, their relative randomness (but at least vague coherence with the surrounding narrative). Not that that's a bad thing for me, I like that show, I even like Westin's somewhat smug tips and tricks (actually, I compiled some 20 out of a long list I found on a web site for newbie players as a quick 101 on what I think a runner should know). Spy Games' Tradecraft could work the same way, which is, I guess, what the chapter aims at. Also, some parts remind me of Spy Games (the movie), like the almost literal part about lies (keep it simple, bla bla). Hey, at least someone did some research here.

Possible Nitpick: CIA and Langley are a CAS affair in SR, right (being in Virginia)? So why compare them to Yale (which is UCAS in SR) and speak of "this country" as though there was an actual USA in SR?

Then, agencies. Here's where we'll see whether canon is getting the War treatment or is handled as respectful as it ought to. First is the UGB. standard russian agency stuff, but reasonably well done. MI5/MI6 next. Can't really remember those form London, but IIRC they were in SoE. Argus and Aegis Cognito then (given the existence of Jellyfish Intel, I'll never say anything about theior dorky names again), Information Secretariat, the CIA and DIA and all the other UCAs and CAS agencies (well, some of them, going by the current USA and it's 25-odd agencies). Short, fast facts in Thorn's anecdotal Westin way of telling things. Reads nice enough. I'd almost say this book is not overall going to stink, but then again I said that about Attitude too. And it did in the end. So, reserving my judgement for now.

A treatise on the tech curve, Technos and the value of not relying on a Matrix that is fundamentally impossible to secure (and emotitoys; not sure if I am angry about their mention or amused at their dismissal) later, we get to the NPC section. Okay, Hardy seems madly in love with teh idea of putting NPCs into his books. The upside: clear differentiation between crunch and fluff, even if they're on the same page (whcih, mostly, they are not). It's not quite ideal but I can't think of any better way to possibly do it, hence I'll save you smugness here and just say it's probably best way to handle this. Unless you want to ban the crunch into the back of the book entirely, that is. The article ended a bit abruptly, with the page space wasted at the end of the 'hotspots's ection, surely a smug good-bye from Thorne would have been possible?

Next stop: counterintelligence, the spy scene seen from the other side of the equasion.

[Nath]

Possible Nitpick: CIA and Langley are a CAS affair in SR, right (being in Virginia)? So why compare them to Yale (which is UCAS in SR) and speak of "this country" as though there was an actual USA in SR?

CIA remains in Langley and remains an UCAS agency. A chunk of Virginia, north of the Rappahannock River, remained in the UCAS as the state of North Virginia. I'm not sure it appears on all SR maps, but the Neo-Anarchist Guide to North America and the novel Just Compensation clearly state the point. Actually, according to the Neo-Anarchist Guide to North America, the Fairfax county itself became part of the Federal District of Columbia. On the other hand, SOTA:2064 says CIA headquarters are in North Virginia. Anyway, CIA is UCAS.

[hermit]

CIA remains in Langley and remains an UCAS agency. A chunk of Virginia, north of the Rappahannock River, remained in the UCAS as the state of North Virginia. I'm not sure it appears on all SR maps, but the Neo-Anarchist Guide to North America and the novel Just Compensation clearly state the point. Actually, according to the Neo-Anarchist Guide to North America, the Fairfax county itself became part of the Federal District of Columbia. On the other hand, SOTA:2064 says CIA headquarters are in North Virginia. Anyway, CIA is UCAS.

Thanks for clearing that up.

And that FastJack's patience about "The Poster With No Name" is starting to wear thinner than his grey mohawk!

Well, being sold out to Horizon probably isn't what he expects from his potpourrie of fans and favourites ...

Anyway, on with my review.

So it's time to discuss the opposition: counterintelligence. Writing is solid and sounds different from thorne, because it's a different voice. That's not been standard in previous books and hence, a good sign. Again, the writing's quality seems on par with Loose Alliances, which is good enough (though not great). Info on the working of agencies tries to take into account that SR is not the current real world with elves, but has mechanisms that are real gamechangers in the realm of intelligence. Well, that's also a step up from Attitude (which failed to even acknowledge the prevalence of holo-TV (TriD) and SimSense). I really like the agencies covered, too. The UCAS now has something that is the Jack Bauer CTU in all but name. On a side note, do I understand this right, the UCAS has even more semiindependent or fully independent agencies than the US? Here's something I miss: inter-agency rivalry. It made 9/11 possible, so it can have horrendous consequences. It should get more than a passing mention by Thorne.Anyway. Truth dancers: interesting. KE: well, that's one of these story updates. At least it fits in and does not stand out like a sopre thumb, like that Horizon guy in War's Bogota article who actually isn't even remotely in Bogota and probably does not exist. KE's entry sound useful too for a Seattle campaign. The SSD are a counterintelligence group masquerading as a protection detail - isn't that what the Secret Service does? Anyway, they're a scary corporate-based enemy. GRU, of course. Zone Defense Force (why isn't the ZDF in teh large Denver section though?).- And the Stasi-like Texas rangers, which again made me both laugh and want to cry. Nice writeup though. Not planning a trip to Texas with any of my campaigns anytime soon, but if I did the Rangers woulkd definitly feature. A Mix of Harry Callaghan, deep-accented Texans and grey-faced creepy Stasi who bug everything and have an incredible web of contacts. Neat. Oversight Board - does it have Aurors? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif) SIS is a new face again, and I don't really see the difference between them and ARGUS, but I guess their marketing towards OC and Megas without a dedicated Elite Spy Force gives them their own niche. Also, it's apparently a hook to get anyone to use Kansei. Well, maybe someone will bite. I probably won't.

Of note: The art in tis book is top notch (one thing that has extremly improved with CGL for some time now and steadily - the only thing unbaffected by the Derp that came with the Line Dev transition), and both the shaman and the Ranger in this chapter are priceless as character/NPC illustrations. Bottom line: useful. Not stunning, or dazzlingly written, but solid and usable, tells you why you should care about it, and comes across as coherent with previous chapters, and established Shadowrun canon.

The chapter then wraps up with two counterintelligence scenarios narrated by Hard Exit. It's actuually solid writing, and I like how he describes the first, an Aztlaner doublebluffing locals in Yucatan into killing UN forces, adnd how Hard Exit stopped him (through harsh and illegal in most civilised states means). The second sums up an op in Denver, a classical investigation and a masterful (and almost legal) conviction of a double agent. The kind of stuff you see in shows like Lie To Me and The Closer. As it'S titled "the Legal Divide", I missed some explanation wrapping it up; as is, it'S more like Hard Exit Tells War Stories. Niot bad, but it could've needed an editor's touch and a new writeup, maybe a pargraph explaining the legalness in the elgal divide.

And now, since it's one of the raw spots in the book, comes another chapter that really left me wondering. It has all the makings of a chapter, but where the previous is some 20 pages long, this is a stunning *three*, including a one-page chapter intro fic. What the fuck?. Is this where the missing 36 pages were? Spy Games was originally announced as 206 pages, but clocks in only 170 in it's final form. What has been cut? Did sanity prevail over madness and potted plant plots, a continuation of the "storyline" introduced in War? do I even *want* to know?

Anyway. The one-and-a-half page text detailing "extraplanar intelligence" actually is a good summary of why and how the metaplanes and spirits affect the way intelligence works in SR. That's a good thing, but does it need it's own 1,5 page chapter? Actually, 1,25 pages, since one quarter of the second page again is empty. This format leaves me wondering, even though the writing as such is not bad or anything. Why not just attach this to the previous chapter? Is this intro fic so damn important to some obscure metaplot build-up? Not to even mention that Milan the tent city (this is Italy, not Vael Dothrak) is the first major break with SR canon in this book. A resounding WTF, though no bad content apart from the intro fic.

Next stop: Spy Stuff. Crunch Time! But not now.

[TW]

London surprised me most in that it did not make me want to type a colourful, insulting rant. It was a logical development of the SoE plot and respectful to canon for the most part. I care a great deal about London as a setting, and while I miss Lord Marchment, they backpedaled from their making this yet another Seattle clone setting apparently.

I'm glad you like it and that the setting's established roots are noticeable. I tried to continue the developments mentioned in 6WA as well as the plots seeded in some olders, like SoE. Out of curiosity, when stating the write up is respectul to canon "for the most part", which parts you noticed that did not?

[Nath]

SIS is a new face again, and I don't really see the difference between them and ARGUS, but I guess their marketing towards OC and Megas without a dedicated Elite Spy Force gives them their own niche.

SIS had a mention in Loose Alliances, page 68, as a competitor of Aegis Cognito based in the CAS. But nothing else was known besides this so far.

[hermit]

Out of curiosity, when stating the write up is respectul to canon "for the most part", which parts you noticed that did not?

That was simply badly worded. I don't know London canon that well by heart, not the later developments at least, so I just can't say if not some small thing about the Pendragon was odd. I haven't found any canon issues in that article though (nor anywhere else, except for the weird Vael Dothrak that Milan suddenly has become). One question though, why no mention at all of Regulus? It's born of the large local manufacturing corp, after all, so it should still be felt nationally? And what happened to the Aztech-NDM Alliance of old? Also, will you also do the London part of Conspiracy Theories?

Overall, Spy Games lookes like a book of old, of the height of Synner's era. Some rough edges and weirdness, but nothing like the total offense War was, nor as lackluster thrown together, unguided and beyong canon as Attitude was (which was good in parts and horrifying in others). Not through yet though.

[Fatum]

C'mon, man. Go read your post. Is that closer to "Hey, can I get some insight," or "Hey, you guys write shit?" Honestly. And then, note that in the same breath you bemoan a lack of information about what's in the book, and mention that the table of contents is there, clearly visible to all and sundry. I mean, it's the table of contents. If that's not "some insight into the product," I don't know what is. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)
I'm glad you enjoyed it, I very much enjoyed working on it. Just do us the favor of remembering not every book is War!, okay? Or, at least understand how treating every book like War! (sight unseen) might explain the scarcity of dev commentary of late, is all I'm saying.

Okay, my grumbling goes under a spoiler tag...

[ Spoiler ]

Frankly, the situation is pretty simple here. The company had a certain reserve of fan trust. It lost it by printing progressively worse books. Thus it'll take more than a couple of more or less decent releases to regain that trust and stop hearing questions like "Does it have the glaring fluff holes Corp Guide had?", "Is it as badly edited and devoid of useful content as 6WA?", "Are the crunch numbers as erroneous as what we got in That Old Drone?", or "Does the pdf has the same weird structure it did in the Way of the Adept?", or finally "Should I just wait for the German version, where the ancient art of pre-print editing is still practiced?" for each new book.
Those are the questions CGL itself has made genuine. You don't like the negative reception? Well, that's understandable. Write better books.

GRU, of course.

They made the Main Intelligence Directorate a counter-intelligence agency now? Any opinions from the UGB on that? :\

Not to even mention that Milan the tent city (this is Italy, not Vael Dothrak) is the first major break with SR canon in this book. A resounding WTF, though no bad content apart from the intro fic.

I'm not too keen on Europe fluff, but isn't Milan kinda a part of GeMiTo urban superagglomeration?

[hermit]

They made the Main Intelligence Directorate a counter-intelligence agency now? Any opinions from the UGB on that? :\

The GRU is more or less for the internal stuff, from what I gather, the GRU is the big scary KGB successor who will have Russian mobstes kill you in your sleep if you fuck with them.
Taken from the text: " The Glavnoye Razvedyvatel’noye Upravleniye (GRU) is the Red Army’s military intelligence directorate, an oft overlooked, but fearsome, presence in the spy game." Also, the GRU runs Speznaz, is in league with the russian mafia, Aztech (because Aztech built thjeir own security service with former GRU people), is very fond of assassinating people, hates technomancers, wants to explode the Resonance realms and has some Winternight sleepers still lurking among them. they are, essentially, acting interior intelligence agency, also out to intimidate army and other officials that they better be in oine with the Kremlin.

Compare: "Upravleniye Gosudarstvennoy Bezopasnosti [are] the inheritors of a couple hundred years of cold Russian brutality, hearkening back to the Cheka, the NKVD, the KGB, and all those other alphabet agencies that perpetually played bad guys in European and American tridsims about suave spies and sinister Russian assassins." My KGB comment was off, hence. Apologies.

I'm not too keen on Europe fluff, but isn't Milan kinda a part of GeMiTo urban superagglomeration?

Yes, which is why it should be houses, not tents. Because Italians are not some sort of Touareg who just long to live in yurts again if their government'd only let them.

[lokii]

CIA remains in Langley and remains an UCAS agency. A chunk of Virginia, north of the Rappahannock River, remained in the UCAS as the state of North Virginia. I'm not sure it appears on all SR maps, but the Neo-Anarchist Guide to North America and the novel Just Compensation clearly state the point. Actually, according to the Neo-Anarchist Guide to North America, the Fairfax county itself became part of the Federal District of Columbia. On the other hand, SOTA:2064 says CIA headquarters are in North Virginia. Anyway, CIA is UCAS.

North Virginia is not on any of the North America maps since Neo-Anarchist Guide to North America. And in that book the map is pretty rough and shows a much bigger portion of Virginia as part of the UCAS. Here is the interpretation I came up with based on the verbal description: http://shadowhelix.de/images/4/4a/Illustra...on_Virginia.png

[TW]

One question though, why no mention at all of Regulus? It's born of the large local manufacturing corp, after all, so it should still be felt nationally? And what happened to the Aztech-NDM Alliance of old?

Wordcount, really. There's a lot of other stuff besides Regulus that I wanted to include in the London write up but then focused on what I considered "the important bits" instead. In hindsight I see the London write up as being not so much about the city than about the state of the nation itself.

Also, will you also do the London part of Conspiracy Theories?

No, I won't.

[hermit]

Wordcount, really. There's a lot of other stuff besides Regulus that I wanted to include in the London write up but then focused on what I considered "the important bits" instead. In hindsight I see the London write up as being not so much about the city than about the state of the nation itself.

I didn't mind that. It was a direly needed update.

No, I won't.

shame really. Just when things started to look up again. Well, hopefully whoever picks this up will continue in the vein you did and not in the vein CGL did with their last two books.

[Fatum]

The GRU is more or less for the internal stuff, from what I gather, the GRU is the big scary KGB successor who will have Russian mobstes kill you in your sleep if you fuck with them.
Taken from the text: " The Glavnoye Razvedyvatel’noye Upravleniye (GRU) is the Red Army’s military intelligence directorate, an oft overlooked, but fearsome, presence in the spy game." Also, the GRU runs Speznaz, is in league with the russian mafia, Aztech (because Aztech built thjeir own security service with former GRU people), is very fond of assassinating people, hates technomancers, wants to explode the Resonance realms and has some Winternight sleepers still lurking among them. they are, essentially, acting interior intelligence agency, also out to intimidate army and other officials that they better be in oine with the Kremlin.

Compare: "Upravleniye Gosudarstvennoy Bezopasnosti [are] the inheritors of a couple hundred years of cold Russian brutality, hearkening back to the Cheka, the NKVD, the KGB, and all those other alphabet agencies that perpetually played bad guys in European and American tridsims about suave spies and sinister Russian assassins." My KGB comment was off, hence. Apologies.

Oh. Well, yeah, "military intelligence directorate", about right. Pretty much taken from SoE otherwise, with all the errors trailing.

[hermit]

Canon. Warts and all. Just look at the Germany setting. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif) Though they fixed Berlin good, gotta hand them that. Looking forward to the Urban Brawl book.

[redwulf25]

Anyone been able to fully translate what the nameless poster said on page 166? Running it through Google translate so far I can get . . . "Dose: Two fifty. Thirty six. One*. Forty-Five*. Forty-seven**. Ninety-two**. Nine hundered and five***. Fifty-eight***. Quarantase. Konets."

Wasn't able to translate the last two unless the writer meant to say sex in Swedish. Presumably they're numbers like the rest though.



*Spanish

**Italian

***Norwegian

[Fatum]

Konets seems to be transliterated "конец", "end" in Russian.

[redwulf25]

Konets seems to be transliterated "конец", "end" in Russian.

Which makes sense for the end of what appears to be a sting on a numbers station. I wonder if quarantase was meant to be quarantasei, which is forty-six in Italian.

[CanRay]

Now I really wish I had been able to learn French.

[Brazilian_Shinob...]

There is nothing there in french.