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Gerzel
Trying to take the same "feel" and "stories" of the SR universe but to update them today.

So first of all you'd have the milestones moved up.

2018: The Shiawase Decision -- Or perhaps not through the same type of events but Corps gain extraterritoriality, or vastly increased power. I'd see this more through a telecoms strike rather than nuke.

2023: New York Quake -- Needed to get the UN off of US soil or perhaps removing the UN entirely. The idea of government between nations and the power of nations needs to be weakened for the Corps to really rise.

2030: VITAS

2031: The Awakening

2032: The Big D

[Edit for clarification of what I mean. Posted here for anyone joining the discussion]

I mean to do a what-if if the timeline for SR 1st ed was written today still keeping the basic feel of a somewhat dystopian world which mixes magic and tech where you have "Shadowrunners" or individuals who work outside the law committing heinous felonies for money mostly hired by big multinational Corps against each other.

The jumping off point, or the point of divergence that John Q. Public would know about and notice can be no earlier than Oct 15, 2007. Basically that means that the major newscasts are going to be the same in this world up till this date.
mfb
moving the Awakening to 2031 would be much less cool. moving it to 2012 i could see, though.
Glyph
I think the whole extraterritoriality thing is the most implausible thing of all, given how dim a view people already have of the big corporations.

More importantly, the big corporations themselves wouldn't really want it - right now, they exert vast influence on government, to the point that you have legislators worrying about how cold medicine manufaturers will feel about an anti-meth bill, or big oil companies invited to sit in on an "energy task force" meeting. Corporate welfare and the military-industrial complex are billion, perhaps trillion, dollar industries. Right now, they get subsidies and tax breaks, and a big say in public policy, without having to worry about roads, or schools, or any of the other troubling things that they would rather have governments deal with.

Rather than this moronic, implausible corporate feudalism, the mega-corporations should be more like Genom in the Bubblegum Crisis series, or hell, any evil coporation in just about any novel, anime, or comic book. Let them be sprawling behemoths who have a bazillion secret projects and own high-ranking public officials. Have hotshot journalists and maverick police detectives constantly being pressured by "upstairs" to make a troubling investigation go away. Have skullduggery going on, and have troublesome witnesses or agitators disappear. People have been doing evil corporations for years without extraterritoriality!
Wounded Ronin
Among many other things the armor in the BBB would be better reflecting improved flexible body armor since the 80s.
GrepZen
And cybernetics to get a fish with a laser would have to come much sooner. You doubt me?! Tell me what was the first cloned mammal...a sheep...named Dolly. Technology is driven by scientists with an odd sense of humor.
FrankTrollman
Yeah, there weren't remote control sharks with lasers on their heads in Shadowrun until Michael and I made it happen in Augmentation. That means that they were new technology in 2070. Seriously dude, sharks with frickin lasers on their heads should have been old tech in 2050.

-Frank
Cthulhudreams
The DOD is working on insects with computer controls like, right now.

Edit: The real difference is the technology is going to be considerably more advanced than is portrayed across the board.
raggedhalo
I think you keep the Awakening and maybe VITAS where it is; it's the subsequent instability that leads to the Seretech and Shiawase Decisions, meaning there's more magophobia in the early days (leading to the Night of Rage). Or perhaps the Night of Rage is what sets the scene for the Shiawase Decision.
Cthulhudreams
The flipside of looking at it is maybe a dystopic setting like SR isn't the correct choice for a new millenia setting, like a post apocalyptic setting it's gone kinda out of date.

OR, can I suggest changing to a global warming future, where there has been massive population displacement and famine, and the rich live in utopic cities surrounded by seething seas of the poor who trade stuff with the rich.
GrepZen
So...kind of like Bladerunner or Battle Angel?
Kagetenshi
Keep the time where it is, remove the collapse of the USSR (rework into a decline similar to that of the USA/UCAS), emphasize a massive breeding campaign/population explosion amongst Native Americans in the '80s and '90s. Reduce governmental power further—it makes no sense that corporations would rely on influence with crumbling governments when they can just do it themselves.

~J
Cthulhudreams
QUOTE (GrepZen @ Oct 15 2007, 06:21 AM)
So...kind of like Bladerunner or Battle Angel?

Eh, kinda, bladerunner isn't going to slice the mustard. I suppose you have to turn to whatever the heck contempoary sci fi is about. I guess I'm thinking off those books set post britian getting taken over by facists and then the people rebelling after a collapse of society cause by climate change.

Less of a caste based society for sure.
nezumi
Make it clear the timeline diverges in 1989. Keep the USSR together as the big red threat, at least until around 2040. Otherwise don't bother trying to 'update' Shadowrun.

Ultimately, if you keep trying to update Shadowrun to take into account real changes in technology and culture, it will stop being Shadowrun. The new thing might be a lot of fun, but it would quickly become not Shadowrun (possibly transhumanism paranoia or something). While things like extraterritoriality are a little silly in regards to realism, they're a pretty major piece of the setting, and even replacing it with a gov't guided by private industry, will completely shift what Shadowrun is into something new.
Kagetenshi
QUOTE (nezumi)
Make it clear the timeline diverges in 1989.

It doesn't. The modern timeline diverges at the latest in 1986, when Warren Burger does not resign in Shadowrun.

~J
Kyoto Kid
QUOTE (nezumi)
Make it clear the timeline diverges in 1989.  Keep the USSR together as the big red threat, at least until around 2040.  Otherwise don't bother trying to 'update' Shadowrun. 

...but that means the Carter wins the 80 election, The Iran situation was not resolved, Berlin remains a divided city, and the demos go on to hold the White House for at least the next 16 years if not through the turn of the century.

By then Reagan is too old and senile to run and "George the 1st" would still be ambassador to China.

Most likely someone like Jack Kemp would have been the GOP's choice.

(...& to think I am a card carrying member of the Democratic national committee). grinbig.gif
nezumi
I have no idea what you are talking about... Reagan won in 1980, not 1989. I'm pretty sure that everything you mentioned happened before 1989.
FlakJacket
China seems to have stepped into Japan's shoes as the big economic, and with them possible military/diplomatic, threat of current times plus the whole Japanese economy imploding bit means things are going to be rejigged a fair bit. That I think is going to have to be one of the major setting departures.

Another thing that I think you'd see would be much more concentration on genetech and molecular engineering or the like straight from the start in tandem with cyberware rather than just cyberware.
Gerzel
hmm I think I may be a little misunderstood here.

I mean to do a what-if if the timeline for SR 1st ed was written today still keeping the basic feel of a somewhat dystopian world which mixes magic and tech where you have "Shadowrunners" or individuals who work outside the law committing heinous felonies for money mostly hired by big multinational Corps against each other.

The jumping off point, or the point of divergence that John Q. Public would know about and notice can be no earlier than Oct 15, 2007. Basically that means that the major newscasts are going to be the same in this world up till this date.
Gerzel
QUOTE (FlakJacket)
China seems to have stepped into Japan's shoes as the big economic, and with them possible military/diplomatic, threat of current times plus the whole Japanese economy imploding bit means things are going to be rejigged a fair bit. That I think is going to have to be one of the major setting departures.

Another thing that I think you'd see would be much more concentration on genetech and molecular engineering or the like straight from the start in tandem with cyberware rather than just cyberware.

Defiantly. Though one thing about China is they have a very different outlook on the world than Japan. One thing I could see happening is a new "mandate of Heaven" Emporer taking over China, perhaps even Lung himself.

Japan would re-arm and go more militaristic but not to the extent that they do in SR. They may very well take control the Philippines and Polynesia but I'd have it be done outwardly through a mutual-protection alliance from China with Japan taking more and more control.

Then have China quietly take control of a puppet North Korea and have South Korea Call for aid and bingo you have a nice new Korean War.


Now for the genetech one way I'd go is towards the transhumanism route. SR already has an element of transhumanism in it (aka Metahumans & cyberware). Transhumanism though doesn't have the emphasis on "damaging" oneself through the use of too much tech. It can and does often warn of the dangers of rampant tech use.

I'd have Bioroids added to the mix. The use of which would be extremely divisive and could very well bring about a regional split in many countries including the EU and the US. I'd say have bioroid's come to a regional head before the Great Ghost Dance occurs for maximum chaos.
Kagetenshi
QUOTE (FlakJacket)
China seems to have stepped into Japan's shoes as the big economic, and with them possible military/diplomatic, threat of current times

I'm not sure I'd call Japan a "threat" as such, though it's done some alarming things recently (moves towards remilitarization, resurgence of the right-wing and increase in whitewashing), but you probably shouldn't count them out just yet—or count China in, for that matter. Japan is unusual in its quantity of domestic manufacturing retained for a country as modernized as it is, while China is on a race to become an economic power before it collapses due to either internal strife or its demand for energy—a demand Japan is in better position to deal with, with its strong nuclear and geothermal programs (though if the crunch happens quickly they'll still be as screwed as just about everyone except, AFAIK, France).

I don't know if Japan is going to return to anything like the prominence it had in the '80s (though it is still the world's second-largest economy, third if you count the EU as a single entity), but I have serious doubts about China in a form recognizably similar to today's country ever becoming an economic superpower.

~J
hyzmarca
If a Mandate of Heaven Emperor takes over China again, it should be Sing-Ling, the Mandate of Heaven Emperor who ascended to the throne in Redemption Part II, the twenty-second episode of Kung Fu: The Legend Continues. Cain protected him from assassins who were trying to stop is coronation ceremony.
Lindt
I like the awakening date as is. The whole maya long count thing is just too cool to ignore.
Kagetenshi
Yeah, if anything I'd move it to match up with the actual Long Count end, but I also like the "the Mayans weren't exact" thing.

~J
Kagetenshi
Another thing I'd change is that I'd strip out all but the merest mention of "hooding", and fill Shadowtalk with active scorn for the concept.

~J
Fortune
QUOTE (Kagetenshi)
Another thing I'd change is that I'd strip out all but the merest mention of "hooding", and fill Shadowtalk with active scorn for the concept.

I could live with that. biggrin.gif
martindv
QUOTE (Kagetenshi)
Another thing I'd change is that I'd strip out all but the merest mention of "hooding", and fill Shadowtalk with active scorn for the concept.

I like it.
GrepZen
"hooding"? What are you referring to? The word seems to reference a ceremonial right of passage / badge of accomplishment. Are you talking about the inclusion of Dumpshock handles in the shadowtalk, the seemingly pointless banter between "posters", or the banter & name dropping of the prime runners/powers that be?
Kagetenshi
"Hooding" is short for "Robin Hooding", or "helping society at large by shooting people in the face for money".

~J
Fortune
'Hooding' is in reference to Robin Hood-type stuff ... such as rob from the rich and actually give it away (as opposed to keeping the loot), or cleaning up a neighborhood just because you can.
Penta
Eh. Hooding is unlikely for pure altruism, but I could see it for "PR" reasons.
Kyoto Kid
QUOTE (nezumi)
I have no idea what you are talking about...  Reagan won in 1980, not 1989.  I'm pretty sure that everything you mentioned happened before 1989.

...the foundation for the demise of the USSR was set by policies (most notably the dramatic increase in the defence budget) adopted under the Reagan administration.

While true none of the actual events took place until after he left office (beginning with Hungary opening it's border with Austria and the fall of the Berlin wall) the hard line stance the US Administration took towards the Soviets under Reagan had definitely set the tone: Soviet style Communism wasn't "in" anymore.

Excluding Reagan, at the time of the 1980 campaign the foremost Republican figures were John Connally, Howard Baker, Robert Dole, John Anderson (who after the convention went independent), and George Bush Sr. Against any of these Carter would have stood a much better chance being the incumbent. Furthermore, none of these other candidates possessed the level of charisma that Reagan had and that was a big part of how he made so much of his rhetoric sound so "good" to so many at the time.

...remember his nickname, "the great communicator"

(again this comes form a "died in the wool" demo.)

...I mean, after all, we are talking about rewriting fictional history anyway...
Gerzel
The Matrix and Cyberspace would be another big change.

I think that cyberspace would be a much more constant overlaid interaction in most first world nations and that it could very well be a good divider of have and have-nots.

What I mean by this is that everywhere in most of the "good" areas is wired and connected so that people who are either wearing glasses or have cybernetic implants can see tags or virtual objects connected with real physical locations in their everyday world. A very good example of this style of cyberspace is shown in the series Dennou Coil a series which revolves around several children solving mysteries of the cyberspace in their home town which is perceived through wearing glasses.

There still would be the classic jacking-in but it would be used more for entering game hosts or for becoming a cyber-version of yourself and moving around distant locations. Wanna visit the Louvre just rent a small cyberbot jack-in from your home town and connect through the internet to a small drone in the real Louvre which you control. People with cyber glases wouldn't so much see the drone but rather would see an image of you overlain over it.
Wounded Ronin
Sadly there would be less of this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nUUTwLVr-bA
GrepZen
QUOTE (Kagetenshi)
"Hooding" is short for "Robin Hooding", or "helping society at large by shooting people in the face for money".

~J

Is this a 4th ED thing because I sure don't remember a whole lot of "Hoodie" talk in any of the earlier books. Or do you refer to the anti-corp mentality of the posts which seems to be a standard for cyberpunk.

For something on topic: To reset the SR storyline a lot of things critical to the feel would need to be reworked...the American Indian tribal aspect (more casinos and probably no Ghost Dance), Mexico may be part of the U/CAS and not a separate evile entity if NAFTA keeps getting its way, the EU as a world power...its much easier to leave the time line as is and just correct some of the bugs.
Eurotroll
QUOTE (GrepZen)
QUOTE (Kagetenshi @ Oct 16 2007, 12:39 PM)
"Hooding" is short for "Robin Hooding", or "helping society at large by shooting people in the face for money".

~J

Is this a 4th ED thing because I sure don't remember a whole lot of "Hoodie" talk in any of the earlier books. Or do you refer to the anti-corp mentality of the posts which seems to be a standard for cyberpunk.

Naw, it's been around, usually right at the front of the BBB where the different kinds of runs are listed. It's certainly in 3rd Ed. But what Kagetenshi meant was that the concept should be scorned in-game, for the obvious reason that Shadowrunners are egotistic bastards looking out for number one. wink.gif
Blade
What would I do if I decided to write a magic+tech game set in a close dystopian future with Shadowrunners?

Take climate change and environmental issues into account: not only is society depressing, but the planet itself is a mess, and even if tech can make life good enough, it's getting more and more expensive.
Mercer
I never understood why SR needed an exact timeline. It seems like the various computer viruses, data crashes and minor apocolypses could have, among other things, made precise date keeping impractical. As well as the decline in education and the rise of megacorporations and the fact that everybody is being bombarded with disinformation, propoganda and spin.

Happy Ares Day! On this Date in 1914 Ares saved the world and made everything better! Get your commemorative Ares holoballoons today!

But I know the answer. Its because as Garrison Keillor says, fiction writers are by nature liars, and as liars we want create something so detailed, so perfect, that it will become reality. That's the news from Lake Wobegone, where all the women are strong, all the men are good-looking, and all the children are above average.
Gerzel
QUOTE (Mercer)
I never understood why SR needed an exact timeline. It seems like the various computer viruses, data crashes and minor apocolypses could have, among other things, made precise date keeping impractical.

Well remember one thing.

SR is typically set about 50 years in the future. Heck a decent number of the posters on this board should still be alive by then.

Even with VITAS in SR there are still people walking around who lived before the awakening, and with advances in cyberware and healthcare quite a few of them should be in pretty good shape.

Furthermore there is a lot of paper out today. So the historical record at least 50 years from now while it probably won't be as strong as the record what we have from 50 years ago is still very stable.

As for the Corp thing, well do you realize how bad it looks when one of your kids gets on international television and spews out blatantly false and ignorant history? It is one thing to tinge history in your favor it is another thing to have people be completely ignorant about it.

Most Corp citizens probably still consider themselves citizens of one Nation or another and Employees of the Corporation. In fact there are great benefits for the Corp that they do this. For one you can fire an employee, but you can only fire upon a citizen, and it looks really bad when you do.
Fortune
QUOTE (Gerzel)
Heck a decent number of the posters on this board should still be alive by then.

Hell, I'll be lucky to actually live to see the dawn f the Sixth World. eek.gif biggrin.gif
bibliophile20
QUOTE (Gerzel)
SR is typically set about 50 years in the future. Heck a decent number of the posters on this board should still be alive by then.

Even with VITAS in SR there are still people walking around who lived before the awakening, and with advances in cyberware and healthcare quite a few of them should be in pretty good shape.

pg 82 in Aug; check out the picture. The birthday boy is currently (2007) nine years old. Methinks that he's still in pretty good shape.
martindv
I'd ditch the idea of ubquitous wireless being set up in less than five years, if for no other reason than because real life has shown how difficult it actually it to wire the "last mile" in even medium-sized cities in five year when modern-day megacorps are involved (e.g., San Francisco)--that is, not a goddamn thing has been done. Fifteen years... Maybe.

Then again, I find it rather insulting given the fact that Internet penetration in the United States is still very low, and there are still parts of this country where there are no phones, and people who have never used them.
Angelone
QUOTE (martindv)
Then again, I find it rather insulting given the fact that Internet penetration in the United States is still very low, and there are still parts of this country where there are no phones, and people who have never used them.

Seriously? Where? That boggles the mind. I know there are places I can't get cellphone reception *cough* Korea *cough, cough* but no phones at all is insane.

Kyoto Kid
QUOTE (martindv)
I'd ditch the idea of ubquitous wireless being set up in less than five years, if for no other reason than because real life has shown how difficult it actually it to wire the "last mile" in even medium-sized cities in five year when modern-day megacorps are involved (e.g., San Francisco)--that is, not a goddamn thing has been done. Fifteen years... Maybe.

Then again, I find it rather insulting given the fact that Internet penetration in the United States is still very low, and there are still parts of this country where there are no phones, and people who have never used them.

...yeah we're going through the pains of this up here in Portland as well.

At best, the system that is in place (MetroFi) is spotty. Some days it comes in fine, other days gotta go down to the corner coffee shop. There are times when your are cruising though the web then wham! all of a sudden every tab comes up "Server Not Found" as you have lost the signal.

I have a node not more than 40 ft from my place (which is supposed to have a 300 ft radius of coverage) and I rarely can get on line from inside my home. Yep. they have a long way to go.
Kagetenshi
There's a post of mine from sometime around the first SR4 FAQ in which I reprint a PM I sent to a writer after the release of Shadows of Europe and the WMI. I go over the issue in more detail there, but suffice it to say that the SR4-style Matrix almost certainly cannot exist unless the laws of physics are significantly and fundamentally different than what we believe them to be.

~J
Mercer
QUOTE (Gerzel)
SR is typically set about 50 years in the future. Heck a decent number of the posters on this board should still be alive by then.

Yeah, but SR games are rarely detailed explorations of history, and the characters who would have been alive for most of big changes are grandparents-- and grandparents are kooks. Its not that the history of the world is unknown, its that its irrelevant. Everybody is looking to the future and dealing with the present. How important is yesterday? Specifically, beyond the broad strokes that magic returned and megacorporations rule the world, how much does assigning dates affect the game?

Beyond that, assigning dates just insures that the timeline created will be outdated if the game continues to be printed and played. SR New York has been hit by an earthquake that never happened, and not hit by terrorist attacks that did. Is sticking to a timeline written in '89 really that crucial? SR's verisimilitude has always been based in that the world is our world, with a few changes and a few years in the future; its not parallel dimension or a galaxy far, far away. Instead the timeline now has some weird overlap, which seems to only draw attention to the fact the timeline was written years ago and never updated.

I mean, versimilitude is going to take a hit either way. Either you retcon the timeline to update it, or you let it become more and more vestigial; that's always going to be the problem with near-future timelines. All I'm saying is, the game is fiction, there's no discernible reason to tie the timeline to specific dates, and whatever vagaries you leave in the players can fill with their own imaginations, and the GM can fill in with whatever works best for the plot.

The Shadowrun Timeline should start out The Day After Tomorrow and end with The Day Before Yesterday.
Kyoto Kid
...I know, here it is the waining months of 2007, and while we sort of have a space station in orbit we still have no base on the moon, no IP ship named Discovery that was lost in orbit around Jupiter, no HAL, and no black monolith floating around going "eeeeeeeeeeeeee...."

Heck even Pan American World Airways went out of business 10 years before the film's events took place. To Retcon it they would have to digitally change the shuttle to Delta Air Lines colours (which purchased all of PAA's routes and assets). :MrYuk:
Gerzel
QUOTE (Mercer)
Its not that the history of the world is unknown, its that its irrelevant. Everybody is looking to the future and dealing with the present. How important is yesterday?

One of the big things I love and I know others love is how it IS connected to history and the past.

One of my favorite runs involves the team tracking down the corpse of Ambrose Bierce (who had awakened and proceeded to do his best to get drunk, or at least pickled.).

Much of the world of SR is intrinsically tied to the past and alternate history. So yes while binding it to dates does mean that the setting eventually becomes outdated It gains a lot more for it.

Still it doesn't hurt to consider a reset every RARE now and then. Once every 20 rl years or so is good IMHO even if it isn't official.

Yesterday is extremely important. It is what brought the power of the Ghost Dance, it is where the Aztecs came from. The new is built on the old in rl and SR.
Kagetenshi
I disagree that it doesn't hurt to consider a reset. Shadowrun has been a different timeline since before it began—again, 1986 is the absolute latest date for the split. Torching the established continuity just to try to stay "relevant" and work, frankly, uninteresting historical developments into the game is actively harmful no matter how rarely it is done.

~J
Gerzel
QUOTE (Kagetenshi)
I disagree that it doesn't hurt to consider a reset. Shadowrun has been a different timeline since before it began—again, 1986 is the absolute latest date for the split. Torching the established continuity just to try to stay "relevant" and work, frankly, uninteresting historical developments into the game is actively harmful no matter how rarely it is done.

~J

Ok you say it is actively harmful to have a reset, but you do not say how it is harmful.

If done well and fully considered a reset can be a good thing to a setting. Now I don't think that such a reset is needed for SR just yet. This thread is just to consider what would be done IF such a reset were to be done.

I think that thinking through what such an SR world would look like could yield a very interesting and playable game world and that considerations, insights and ideas found during such a consideration may just be useful in the cannon storyline.

What is actively harmful is poor writing, editing and consideration of the setting in core material.
GrepZen
I think the whole point of "re-bootin" the time line is to make the "world" more believable and therfore more appealing/marketable to future players. If I were a noob and looking at the BBB4 timeline I'd say "interesting premise...but why did they rewrite history when this looks like a futuristic cyberpunk game. And why isn't Z device in here, its been out for ages."
SRs biggest strength was its timeline and how everything just fit (barring the magic which actually had a good explination), it was a plausible (for the 80s) look into the future. Every year IRL we would see something that had been refered to in the book happen / be developed and it was good. The suspension of disbelief was easier as time passed...then, after the Y2K bug, things seemed to be less relevant and a tad more hookey. Its still a good game but, reminds me more of D&D than the "This is the future" game I loved.
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