And why shoud they not be able to thwart megacorps. As far as I am concerned Saeder Krupp is just another megacorp, I don't give a rats ass that a GD is at the helm. What I am saying is that it does not matter. Everything is malleable. The fact that a GD is a major player in a situation should not result in auto failure, which is what I get from the assorted threads or posts related to them on this board. Going against the wishes of a GD equals you are doomed to failure. All I am saying is that, that is total bullshit. YMMV

I agree with you to a point. I have always thought that shadowrun is a game where you can go after anyone given enough planning and within reason.

I dont think johnsons are know all behind the scenes type of guys. if they are played right they have motives and feelings just like everyone of us. Its the GD and AI's you have to worry about.

But with that said I think trying to take loffy down a peg by yourself is not a good idea. I think it would take an organization (or a couple) to put the dragon in a position to be put down a peg or two. It is frustrating to see so many hints for Loffy to be put down a peg but nothing ever comes into fruition. I need to see loffy hurt he's shadowruns golden boy (Litterally) and even gold tarnishes a little over time. So i see where your comming from but in no way should something like "We killed loffy" take place at home with your buddies. Save it for a con where you can try and convice one of the writers to do something about it.

I guess I just don't care/worry about the meta-plot as far as how my games will or won't fit into it.

I would have no problem whatsoever letting players take down a GD, a corp, etc, as long as the game got to that point in a logical enough manner.

As far as getting writers to care, I really don't care what the writers do. Once I buy it, it's my game, and I ignore written plot as needed for the game I'm running.

Not to attack you or anything I'm currious, Why hate on the meta-plots they create a buzz about the game and lets players know that the game world is constantly being manipulated.

I love to participate in that minipulation its the ultimate democratic control and makes the game for the people by the people (I'm a geek I swear). Thats why I feel in love with Shadowrun over D&D in the first place. I feel like I can do more with the meta-plots to create or be apart of one of my or my GM's meta plots (a pyramid of plots). So yeah I agree the game is mine when I buy the book but these writers come up with somethings that I can't dream or keep up with because I missed out on Earth Dawn for D&D.

It does matter a little what the writers think. Overall Sahdowrun and RPGing is a social event and I would like to take it to an epic level like a MMPRPG but actually see who I'm playing with, where they are from and what was the motivation for their character. Overall I feel when you buy the book you agree with the game world.

So why drastically change it in a way that you topple a mega? The idea is fun but why buy the game if your going to change the world in such a way that if you played it with someone not in your group it would be differant?... Let me shut up I feel like my college proffesor when we were talking about space and time

I think killing Lofwyr is a little extreme. I mean first it's been done to a GD already so the impact would be lost. You get oh hey another one just bit the dust. Also he's too valuable to waste. There are only so many GDs out there you know. I can't just do a little dance then I'm the next Great.

Now do I think he needs to screw up royally? Definately. Nothing and nobody is infallible.
Loffy is like a grandmaster of chess. He wins consistantly, he can make mistakes and still win consistantly. He can also blow it big time. I think something from left field could manage it.

I'm not saying it has to be world shattering, just...embarassing. Then of course you get such gems as, "You may have won today, but next time, there WILL be a next time, your ass is mine." I suspect nervous laughter follows on the part of the person he's talking to and several sleepless nights follow.

Good points and my bad I'm a cannon whore too and the reason I was so sckeptical was that my first GM/DM was a crack GM and never planned anything out.

But you have to consider that the dragon hunters are still out there doing their thing. If you don't want to kill off a GD, howzabout having their shadow war spill out into the wide open; leading to dragons becoming more of pariahs, leading to a much lower influence around the world as people actively try to wrest control from all things draconic.

or just kill a lesser dragon

"lesser dragon"

sounds like the old saying from ED

"Calling a Common Dragon by that name is one of the fastest ways to die in Barsaive"

I am not advocating finishing off a GD, all I am saying is that even Lofwyr's plans should develop wrinkles, because ultimately that is what mortals are good at. There should not be an unwritten rule of perfection in regards to their plans. It is the little guys who really screw things up, and most of the time that is where most players wind up. All I am saying is give their plans a chance of unexpected, unwanted involvement.

You know the old saying about everybody being someone's son or daughter? Well this mama or papa can eat you.

That reflects my point Metahumans is what it is ultimately about not a bunch of overgrown lizards.

To an extent. The metahumans are generally agents. And that's not always the case. Sirrug and Alamaise, as examples, prefer to handle things directly , or at the least be very hands on.

BTW, more punctuation in the future please. Otherwise your post takes a couple re-reads.

I agree with eidolon about picking whichever rules suit me. The GM is over-powerful. The thing is, let your players know what rules apply and which don't, so that there are no confusions.

About metaplots, I've had some campaigns in other RPGs than SR (especially warhammer) which could be considered metaplots, but I didn't want to have my stories conflict with the "official" story, so I just took some place never mentioned anywhere, and built whole towns and governments and all out of my imagination.
Shadowrun is perfect for this: you can invent a megacorp, not AAA, but A or AA, and pick a city no one talks about, preferably in a country like Namibia or Hungary: you can have your runners kill a whole board of executives of a multi-billion nuyen company in a 15-million-soul city, saying "hey, this is 2070, and in 2070 Namibia has this large city and this large company, no one said different".

Generally speaking, good RPGs have plenty of room left for your imagination, you don't *have* to use Lofwyr or Damien Knight or another "famous" character to set up your own meta-plot. You just have to use your imagination more, and plan better: that is, you have to be an experienced, imaginative, and "hard-working" (passionate) Game Master. And patient players (the last such "metaplot" I did took us more than a year to play out).

Yes PR is great, but my point is no one is perfect and no matter how good someone or thing is some shit has to seep out. Lofwyrs shit don't smell like roses no matter how much spin you put on it.

That's why dragons have the spell 'Transmute Feces to Roses' actually.

Nah you hit it on the head. I was afraid you would ream me out for asking in the first place.

Good point about MMRPG's I havent been to a con yet but if i did this is how I envision it. Go with your at home group, split up and look for clues, come back at the end and talk about what you found and how it would make the game world better.

By no means do I support the hive mind of generic MMRPG's where you have the same classes, spells, items ect. Thats why table top gaming will be superior because its highly customizeable, mutable, and fun. But I do want a game for the people and SR has filled that void. I just want to be apart of creating the change (RPG revolution!) and that means interacting with the writers to let them know in a democratic way what plots work and what doesnt and then they change according to our feedback (like I'm a stockholder in their company, I want them to work a little harder for me DAMIT )!.

As far as buying the product you vote with your dollars but i cede that point to you. I never thought of playing the way you do through specific time periods. If I had a group right now (HINT: IM STILL LOOKING FOR A GROUP TO PLAY WITH IN CHICAGO) I would want to stay current and in the midts of all the action... More power to you for being more creative than me.

RPGing is like a sport in some senses that you get better playing with or against people who are better at playing than you are. So thats where my MMRPG comment stemed from. Thats why Dumpshock rocks to me I'm evolving as a Shadowrun RPGer

HINT: MOVE FROM CHICAGO

Besides, here in Utah, we have popcorn!

Persoanlly, I'd go nuts playing on line all the time. Half the fun for me is vamping with my friends between the action.

I think he's talking more about learning from someone more experienced.

Yeah, probably. I'm inordinately tired for only having been up since 7 this morning.

Competition between 'players' and I will crack down fairly hard.


Learning/mentoring between players and I will reward.

Competition between 'characters' depends on the game, setting, and what folks want.

Amber , WoD, and the likst just ain't the same with out at least a little inter-player rivalry.

'Nam, Twlight 2000, etc they had better be working (mostly) alot more together then against each other.


As to 'offical' story. I go with one of the ones who posted that:

1) I often do not play in the 'now', either because I have something I want to use, Bug hunt, Shutdown, etc or just because.

2) Rarely will will directly 'overule' cannon. If so it will directly be stated at the begining. HOWEVER, I will also state, that anything they have read is exactly that, something they read/saw/heard on the new, rumor mill, etc.

Big D is presumed dead killed by a a missle. Some people claim that he 'sacrificed' himself to save the world from some big bad thing. IF the people have the appropriate knowledges and/or contacts they may know both of these.

That doesnt mean, Big D, didn't just decide that leading humans to a better world was too much work, to leave them to their own, and isnt off drinking pina colad's on the beach somepalce.

Unless I have directly told you otherwsie at the start. Anything you read in offical things (to include novels) is generally safe to assume the people 'in the know' belive that. Now I might question how your 'character' knows the information if you dont have a reason, but if you do and I havent told you otherwise directly, it is safe to assume that rulebooks, splat books, and novel are all 'real' in so far as that is what the appropriate people belive.

Then again, the USSR had several times the number of ICBMs that we did, and we even saw the parade footage of them..... (so what if two-thirds of them were cardboard


Peace

I know in my writing, I try not to make anyone infallible. I don't care if they are a corporate CEO, a free spirit, a great dragon, or an immortal elf. Everyone has flaws, everyone can make mistakes, and everyone can be bested by someone else. I don't have a problem at all with a human outmaneuvering a great dragon, but you have to remember one thing. Great dragons think longer term. You can definitely win a battle against a dragon, but that dragon might get his revenge on your grandchildren. Assuming he can't just eat you.

But another thing I try to avoid is heroic activism. I tend to see Shadowrun as a game more about anti-heroes than heroes. Sure, taking down the big players could be possible, but it shouldn't make for a happy ending. There are consequences to all actions, especially in a world as interconnected as the Sixth World. My players have often made impacts on the world, but they are also left wondering if those changes were worth the price.

As for individual GMs deviating from the metaplot and doing their own thing? Go for it! I do it, myself. I try to write in tons of plot hooks that I never plan to do anything with, just so GMs can take them up if they want to and go crazy with them.

Thanks for your writer's take on it DE. How much editing does your stuff (and others if you can speak to it) go through before release, and have you ever seen that editing affect tone? I admit that I don't keep up with who writes what, so it may well be that none of your stuff ever left me with that "the Johnson knows everything" feeling.

See, personally, the whole GDs think "long term" thing has always stuck in my craw somewhat, even. Why should they? Granted, (and this is according to my limited knowledge of the ED to SR continuum, mostly because it's just another part of the meta that I tend to ignore), they were alive "way back when", but then they were asleep for what, centuries? And they woke up with the rise in mana that brought on the Awakening, right? So at most, they're in their 60's (this time around)? How does that somehow magically confer that they think "long term" any more so than any plotter and schemer does? Long life span? Tell that to Dunk.

That's just the sort of thing that I try to avoid in my games. I know that it's accepted canon and that most people are probably totally cool with stuff like that, it's just that I've never been able to get past how silly it is to me.

As far as the tone of game, it varies from group to group and game to game for me. I've ran games where everyone's left with the thousand yard stare before, and I've ran games where you can almost hear the Ewok theme at the end.

I've actually run a game where Lofwyr got his. Basically a Major NPC sacrificed himself to get a nano-weapon into lofwyr's digestive tract, which put the major hurt on the dragon.

Of course, He's not dead, just horribly crippled, which makes him all the more fun for me. His physical body is nearly useless, he can't ever take anything into his own claws again, but his mind is still entirely intact and able to manipulate things. But he's no longer seen as infallible, and so is enemies are far more proactive. Makes for fun in my campaign, Your milage may vary. But by my personal timeline, it happened a year after the, so things will have stabalized somewhat by 2070.

Unfortunately, the other main thing I wanted to see in the plot was to see the Renraku Arcology abandoned by everyone (I mean, who would EVER was to rent an apartment there ever again?) and left to the squatters, bringing a peice of the barrens strait into downtown. It seemed logical and dystopian, but the runner havens book had the Arc as a public housing project. Similar, I suppose, but not as fun.

For me, the long term look that GDs and IEs have, is rather simple in concept, but can be harder to do in practice.

They are not in a rush to get things done, they can afford to wait a year, 10 years, 100 years to see their plans come into effect.
They are not rushing to get a big nest egg so that they can retire before they are 55, or such.
If a project that they are working on will take a century to be finished, they do not have to worry about some distant relative not finishing (or botching) the project, as they will be there to completion, and perhaps modify it so that it meets their intent rather than the letter of the project.

As for them taking revenge on your grand children, I think that is myth, a complete fabrication. It would not stop someone from doing anything to GDs, because they would not face any consequences. And, what if they didn't have any kids.... Look at our society now, we waste all kinds of resources on all kinds of unnecessary toys, instead of spending a fortune on renewable power sources, the environment, etc... We know that there are and will be trickle down effects to the next generations, but most of us can't seem to get past our "needs".

GDs and IEs do not like being targets, and will, if they can, immediately hurt those that targetted them. But they will most likely put their priority on damage control.
If they can't get immediate revenge, they will find a way, maybe in a month, year, etc.. The next time they need a runner team to die doing a run, they will probably have the team that hurt them hired for the run..... Word will get around that if you successfully do a run against a GD or IE, you are dead and your body just doesn't know it yet.

Page 117, RUnner Havens.

(Missed that they do get a handful of "Vacataion Days" a year, where they can leave ... with guards.)

I'd lay good odds that everyone there has RFID implants, to make sure that if anyone slips away, they can be found quickly.

Security RFIDs
And they put them in your teeth. You didn't think all that free dental care was from the kindness in their miniscule hearts, did you?

I would think that the corps and prisons, would vary the place that they put security RFIDs, just so that runners and other criminals do not know exactly where to look.

Hmm, wonder if they have stealth security RFIDs. That would be a nasty idea....

The emergence of the dragon Calozerca is similiar to the release of a Horror-tainted dragon from the Horrors sourcebook.

This plot was mentioned in D6W. Any leads on where this is going I missed earthdawn so connecting the dots is a little hard

I was about to go find and "quote in" my thoughts on that...but darn you Fortune, you were the one I was discussing it with!

That Dragon think long term schtick is often taken too far.

So Dragons plan for the next century? Good for them, but any war is made of dozens of battles and hundred of skirmishes and to win those you have to hustle like everybody else. And to say that it doesn't matter if you lose this battle or that one because you are taking the long view is hogwash. Sure, not every battle is crucial. Sure you have to plan ahead. But you lose too many battle, or you lose the one you couldn't afford to lose, and you may not have a long term prospect.

Imagine the Americans had been crushed at Midway and the Japanese had been able to freely bomb the West Coast during WWII. Think things would have been the same? At worst the US would have lost to Japan and at best they'd have been unable to help on the European front, would have been forced to accept a negociated cease fire instead of an unconditional surrender and then would have been nearly bankrupt, with the West Coast infrastructure needing to be rebuilt and no juicy contract coming from Europe (Either Germany or USSR would have been the victor). And then what happens to postwar economic boom? And then what does 2006 US look like?

So if Roosevelt had been a long term planning Dragon, he'd still have needed to hustle to win that battle at all cost or else his careful agenda for the next century would have been scrapped.

At best, Dragons anticipate the next big move better than most and are able to apply more ressources than most on these crucial turning points. They are therefore much less likely to lose these crucial battle. But if they lose... They're screwed just like any puny mortal and will need to rebuild. A century down the line they may still feel the sting.

If you are a lesser Dragons than Lofwyr, you can end up fighting against a puny human who has more ressources to throw at the battle than you have and then the best you can do is fold like any good poker player who knows he's beat. And to take the poker analogy further ; sometime you can make all the right decisions and still lose ; the nature of the game (both poker and war) means that at some crucial junctions you have to commit ressources before all the facts are in. Or else you lose. But whenever you commit before all the facts are known, you can get screwed by lady luck. So you can make all the right decisions and still get hurt.

And then don't pretend the loss didn't hurt because no matter how good a planner you are, you have to discards many of your potential plans and draw new one. And nothing changes the fact that ten move from this one, you will still be significantly behind where you would have been if you hadn't lost that crucial battle. Even if you are a Great Dragon.

So Bottom Line ; GD can lose. Badly. To puny adversaries. Even if they made all the right decisions based on a thorough analysis of the situation. Their % of wins has to be freaking high but they get in so many struggles in a single year that they are bound to get hurt at least a few time yearly. And its a silly conceit to assume that some magical backup plan will be able to make the loss irrelevant. To assign so much ressources to back up plans would be moronic ; you wouldn't lose nearly so often if you assigned those ressources to the fights you lost in the first place!

Dang, Charon. Fine way of putting it. Thanks.

eidolon, I think you completely missed my point.

I agree that it can be taken too far, but it does have to be taken into account.

Of course Great Dragons are fallable. Look at Alamais(e) ... he isn't having too easy of a time at the moment, but there was a time when his plans didn't go awry nearly as much, but it was his brother who was somewhat insignificant. And just look at his brother now.

Not every single thing that Dragons plan for will come to fruition. The thing is that they can (usually) live and still prosper through whatever long span of time it might take for some things to fall into place.