SR5 Core Options

[JonathanC]

I've been in a bit of a Pathfinder mood for the past year or so, and one thing that my local game store had been trying was the "Core only" Pathfinder Society campaign. It turned out kind of fun, made character generation easier, and added some challenge as we had to make do without some of the power creep items from the newer books. It got me thinking: would something similar work for Shadowrun 5e? Has anyone tried it? What might the obvious pitfalls be?

The first thing that comes to mind is that unarmed might get a lot weaker without the martial arts maneuvers in Run & Gun, but since I never got a chance to read through Data Trails, I'm not sure what the effects on deckers/technomancers would be.

[Mantis]

It's how I first tried 5th ed, since the other source books weren't out yet. I found it annoying since there were rules and details not available that the players wanted to use. Things they had gotten used to in 4th ed or that we expected to be able to do that were noted as being detailed in an upcoming book. Oh, but melee didn't feel very limited, since it was dealing more damage than in the previous edition.

[Deckbeard]

I think your expierience, as Mantis suggests, is going to vary pretty heavly depending on whether or not the players are SR veterans. Shadowrun is and always has been gear porn, its about what your character has. Pathfinder on the other hand is all about what your character is. Yah magic items are important but at the end of the day there are more space given to character options then to stuff options. If your group has a history playing shadowrun then they are going to be looking for their old favorites and absolutly will feel constrained by the core book only. If they have never played shadowrun before then I absolutly suggest doing this. Infact I think this is the best way to introduce new players to shadowrun. Let em make a 'core' charcter and then once they have a grasp on the rules let them branch out and rebuild with the options from other books.