OK, having read most of the way through the Ghostwalker thread, and seeing that a couple people seem obsessed with the idea that everything, from your government to your local newspaper to your pet dog, Fluffy, is actually run and controlled by Great Dragons and Immortal Elves, that got me thinking...is it REALLY so?

Sure, we have the cases of 3 Great Dragons forming Amazonia, we have Lofwyr running one of the Triple A's, we have Ghostwalker sitting in power in Denver, and Masaru involved in the running of the Phillipines. Sure, we HAD an Immortal Elf on the Tir Taingire council of Princes(and he was deposed and replaced, while Lofwyr was replaced with a more progressive Great Dragon), and Tir nA nOg was founded by Immortal Elves. Sure there are some indications that an Immortal Elf CLAIMS to have taught the Great Ghost Dance.

Now, though..what is the situation?
The Immortal Elves were kicked out of power by a coup in Tir Taingire. And, while we have people saying that the current Queen of Tir nA nOg is an immortal Elf, as I understand it, she was born in the current Century, so how do we really know she is? Just because someone claims something does not mean it is so. Also, is the entire Ruling Council of Tir nA nOg Immortal Elves? Or does it consist f others? I remember that not all seemed to have heard of Aina in "Worlds Beyond"

For the Dragons, let's see..let's start with the first known one, shall we?
Ryumo, the Incarnate Kami at the Shrine of the Silver Dragon. The dragon who is handling the Fung Shui of several districts in Neo-tokyo, who is worshipped as a Living Kami by the Shinto Priesthood, and who rules the Yakuza of Neo-tokyo with an iron fist..well...except for the large group of Yakuza who broke away, and have been waging a sort of war between the two sides. OK..so he doesn't run the Yakuza anymore, and his Ally Spirit broke from under his control. So..he controls the Shinto Priesthood..right? Not really. He may be a living Kami, but he is JUST one Kami among countless, and teh Shinto Priesthood are going to try and make sure everything is balanced and harmonious. If he does something that goes against the Shinto idea of Balance, he will have the whole priesthood against him. Given that the Emperor respects the Shinto Priesthood(they and his wife are responsible for many of his reforms getting through, after all), he would likely give them the aid of the Japanese military if they requested it. Now, let us think about this: despite that Ryumo is a Great Dragon, he did not have ANY influence in the Japanese government to not do things like the Yomi Law. No..it was the Empress who convinced the Emperor to propose, and the Diet to approve the repeal f the Yomi Law. The perfectly HUMAN Empress. We know she is Human, because she did not go to Yomi the second she stepped off the Shiawase Extra-terratorial grounds. Seems to me Ryumo does not really control Japan.

Aden: Sure, he destroyed Tehran...but what has he done since? And, in his defense, Tehran DID declare war on him, first.

Lofwyr: He controls one of 10 Triple A megacorps. ONE among 10. Damien Knight is as powerful as a Great Dragon. Heck..the guy who runs Horizon is as powerful as a Great Dragon.(Now..sure, we know Aztechnology has a Great Dragon somewhere in its upper echelon). Lofwyr does NOT get to tell all the Triple A's what they can and cannot do.

Celedyr(?): You know..that Dragon on the Tir Taingire Council of Princes. I am sure, given his age, his voice commands great influence. But, I think the rest of the Council of Princes can STILL vote against him.

Dunkelzahn: Sure, he's dead, but his reach stil influences things. However, his "corp" is run entirely by humans and metahumans. Sure it operates at his bequest, and serves functions he wanted it to..but, those wishes are interpreted by human minds.

Ghostwalker: SURE, he runs Denver as his Feudal Domain. However, really, how much power does he REALLY have? Smugglers pay taxes to him, sure. The security forces are now under his authority, not various corps. But, really, what does he REALLY do? I got the impression that he mostly just sits there, looking menacing, and telling people to "Play nice, or else!"

I do deem you flame bait

My answer is: Kinda, maybe, depends if it would be FUN to run it one way or the other. As much as I love Shadowrun I hardly think it's Dostoevsky and not subject to modification. My take is that dragons are basically one being mega organizations that are subject to most of the rules all the other huge players are. I find this no less offensive than the idea that Damien Knight basically has a pet corporation to do his bidding.

I will also note that there are people that think "Loose Change" is a credible source for 9-11 information. And I'm sure that ICly there are plenty of people and organizations (Humanis! *cough cough*) that fully buy into and preach the whole "Dragons and Elves (exclusively) run the world".

The thing is, judging by how people explain how GW survived his take over, all your examples could be explained as the dragons actually running things through behind the scene plots and planning.

Using the reasons of "superhuman intellect and 10'000 years of experience and long, long planning and superiour magic", Ryumo could have influenced Japan's politics on every level. Who says he was not influencing the emperor's wife? Or wants people to think he doesn't influence japan and the shinto priesthood? Or that he left some clan break away for show?

Who says how far Lowfyr's reach goes? What corps he has his claws in?

Once you're entering the "Well, that Great Dragon is alive, so what he did was not a mistake, so there has to be a reason for it" territory, you can explain everything as you want it to be.

Saying "Lowfyr doesn't run Europe" is as logical as is saying "Lofwyr runs Europe " (after all, he did take control of the matrix during crash 2.0, so, what else has he in store?) or "GW had planning, tactics and magics ready for the 6th world even though he just had burst out of an astral prison hours before".

Now add how Dunkelzahn supposedly planned his death so far ahead that it caused all sorts of things to fall into place as he wanted it, and the whole argument of "Ryumo does not control Japan" looks rather weak.

In short: If all that people were saying about GDs and their powers was true, then there's no way anyone can "prove" they do not run the show on the planet, through multiple layers of plots and influence. It comes down to "if they are so powerful to do this, why wouldn't they be doing that as well?"

There are plotlines which are governed entirely by creatures which remember the 4th age, which is a very short list. If you want to engage with the Horrors plotline, for example, you have to get some eye witness testimony. And that means that everything you do involves working for an Elf, a Dragon, or a Spirit.

On the other hand, there are a lot of other advances in the world which are not affected in any meaningful way by dragons. Yeah Lofwyr is the Chief Executive Dragon of S-K. But Inti Jiwana is like number three or four on the AZT board. The people ahead of him are just really bad ass metahumans.

With the exception of Lofwyr, if an immortal wants to get their way most of the time they have to restrict themselves to small sandboxes - just like normal people do. Mugabe is the absolute ruler of Zimbabwe, but it's just Zimbabwe. Big countries and organizations have to accept compromise. Even when the big D was president of the UCAS he didn't control everything in the UCAS. The balance of power was still in the hands of congress ad corporate lobbies.

The places where immortals have unmitigated sway over what gets done tend to be out of the way shit holes. Tir na nOg is a tiny provincial postage stamp. It's interesting, but honestly the place sucks. If it sank beneath the waves Atlantis style the rest of the Sixth World would notice it because the resulting tidal wave would delay trans-Arctic shipping for a few weeks. The actual lost economy of the three million isolated people would be essentially meaningless. Recall that the entire Tir has less economic, social, and military clout than the city of Atlanta.

And even within the field that the Immortal Elves and Great Dragons play in, they aren't the only player, or even necessarily the best. Ares for example, hired Theresa Montgomery to run their medical operation and similar consultants to run their Eden Station for proactive planetary defense. They are happily horror hunting while simultaneously telling the Elves and dragons to go fuck themselves. So even in their narrow field of mastery their position is hardly unassailable.

-Frank

I agree with Frank's reasoning. Which is why I personally don't buy into all the hype about a Great Dragon's power, magic and experience being so much above everyone else.

Well, you see my take: They don't. really control the world. They influence it, sure. Maybe their influence has greater impact because they think in very long terms. Ironicly, though, that long term thinking hurts them, as well. Humans think short term, and so will do things that those who think long term really don't think of. Look, for isntance, how fast technology has developed RL over the last century. Someone who thought long term would involve a slow creep of technology, while, because humans are not only short lived, but also get in ALOT of wars, technology developed rapidly to keep troops alive, defeat the latest terror machines(the Tank, chemical warfare, aircraft). The Dragons and the Immortal Elves do have an advantage in that they know magic the rest of the world doesn't know. however, the question becomes: How long until metahumanity, through its shadow conflicts, and more open conflicts, through the short lives of the metahumanity spurring them on to develop new things faster just to stay alive one more day in the Shadows, in Security, or in the Military, catch up to them? How far has magic come already in 6th World? Look, enchanting used to be a Metamagic, now it is just a regular magical skill. There were mentions in Street Magic of unique enchantments, not just the standard stuff of making Foci from previous editions. Honestly, I think that any power advantage the Dragons and Immortal Elves had is slowly fading away, just by the knowledge we are seeing spreading around and being rediscovered slowly. Imagine what will hapen when the first magician discoveres Spell Matrixes....

Hm, didn't think of it that way Trollman. GD and IE's do seem relegated to out of the way places and positions, areas where they can get away with growling and saying "Respect your elders". They're still powerful but like you said, not unassailable.

I for one will vote for any measure that includes sinking Tir Na Nog..

Damn elves.

No, for the most part, GDs and IEs do not run the show. It's for a number of reasons, but the biggest is basically because they have no interest. They have other concerns, other cares, and are basically off in their own little worlds playing games and politics 90% of the time.

Honestly, I think most people look at GD's the wrong way. In Shadowrun, Dragons are a Power, not an individual. They're just a Power confined to a single body (for the most part). Dragons play on the same field as corporations. Saying "I can kill a Ghost Walker" is the same as saying "I can kill Ares". And it can be done. It's just very, very difficult, and it's not going to be accomplished with a full frontal assault.

I fully agree with that. Lots of people however will and did not.

That said, time to put on the Mod Hat, since the original thread had been walking the line for a while, and stepped a bit over it this morning. This is a little preemptive strike since we're treading the same ground.

Once again, I'm going to remind you that different people see Shadowrun different ways. There are dozens of different gaming styles that get played in the SR world. You're free to discuss these differences, but do not, under any circumstance, insult someone because they play the game differently than you, or because they believe something differently than you.

Play nice, respect the opinions and beliefs of your fellow Dumpshockers, and be willing to walk away when you can't agree with someone.

How does playing games and politics mean they are not running (or ruining) the world? Especially if each GD is a power on the level of Ares. What other than the world would they be playing with or for?

My take is not necessarily that the know MORE, just that they know DIFFERENT things. think of it like this: Dragons are the Cardassian Assasin on that one old Cardassian station. humans are Miles O'Brien. The dragons fight under one set of rules, they live by that set of rules. However, if you throw them something completely unexpected, like a bomb you cobbled together from a phaser power-cell and your communicator, they tend to find themselves out of their element. That is probably why the Dragons and the Immortal Elves generally end up in out of teh way places...those are their "comfort zones." Really, even those that DO end up in big areas(Ryumo, Daddy D, Lofwyr) seem to stick to niche areas. Face it, Dunkelzahn was pretty much just a media celebrity. Dunkelzahn was a dragon Ronald Reagan! Sure, Ryumo might have alot of influence, but really, where does it go through? the Yakuza and the Shinto Priesthood. Lofwyr, for all his corporate might...well, simply put, Lofwyr is JUST a corporate CEO. Sure, he has influence throughout europe because of the Matrix 2.0 and the strength of his company, but, ultimately, his motivations are teh same as any CEO: Strengthen his corp. Considering he and Damien Knight are about equal in terms of economic savy, I personally expect that the two are constantly playing an intricate chess game using corp assets(both open and deniable) as pieces.

GD's and IE's run nooks and corners and parts of the show, but not "the show." In one game the big super-monstrous villain could be Lofwyr himself, a game chock full of the supernatural intrigue of inhuman politicians. In another game, one running through virtually the same adventures, killing the same NPCs, targeting the same facilities and attacking them in the same manner...but the focus of the game could be the Saeder Krupp megacorporation, in a purely calculated business sense, rather than the immortal at it's helm.

It's weird, huh? It's almost like the devs sat and and set up a game world where if you want to focus on the machinations of Earthdawn-linked immortals and their super-magical rivals, you could do so, and if you wanted to ignore most of it except for the occasional headline and news broadcast, you could run a game that was never directly influenced by it (and focused instead of the comparatively mundane megacorporate side of things).

Huh. What a freaky accident, for things to have fallen together that way!

Indeed!

I would be more inclined to say they are powers on a par with Double A's then on a par with Ares. The only reason why Lofwyr is on a par with Ares is that he is the CEO of a triple A, just like Damien Knight.

My own take has always beebn that the real powers are not Dragons, or Immortal Elves, or the Mega Corps, or even the governments. It is the people who have the will, the dedication, and the raw tenacity to stick to their dreams, no matter how many times they get nocked down. The only people with any real power will always be those who will strive against the odds to carve out there own place.

Who had the real power in the novel Aftershocks? The Corp that kicked the hospice out, or the hospice when it rebuilt ina new place? To me, it was the hospice.

But, Critias, there's this thing such as "internal consistency". If a Dragon is so far above humanity that it can pull off what GW did (read all the justifications people make up for his survival), then how can other dragons fare much poorer against other humans?

How can Lowfyr play chess with Damien knight and not wipe him from the board in a few moves if GW can do that to all of an entire city's leaders?

Why would GW be able to play Aztlan for a fool like this, and yet Aztechnology's own GD is of lower rank than others in th corp?

As I said, I don't see the world as run by GDs and IEs, but I also don't hype them to the level I saw in the other threads.

Or, to put it more bluntly: Why on earth is Lowfyr not controlling half the world, given his supposedly godly intellect, experience and magic, and the ressources of the biggest megacorp in existence in SR, if GW supposedly managed to take Denver from a number of nations using exactly such an intellect, magic and experience?

It simply does not add up.

He doesn't want to. He's not in the mood.
Of course he rule half the world, ah fuck it, the entire world. And space. But he has become lazy in the last time.

Do they? Yes.

But so does Damien Knight, Renraku, and the other megas. So to do the various countries.

How much do they control the world? As much as the other power players let them. (i.e. not much, too many players, too little power to share.)

...actually it's a child like young woman from Croatia with a penchant for making things explode.

The innocent looking ones, they're always the most dangerous.

My always unpopular opinion is that it's perfectly reasonable to play the exact age of GDs and IEs with a fair amount of ambiguity. Just because some pointy eared Goebbels is telling you that the ruling council of Tir Na Nog has been alive since the 4th world doesn't mean he's telling the truth; we've seen regimes use false mysticism to legitimize their rule before. The big problem with me using ambiguity like that is that the GDs and IEs all seem to agree on what the 4th world was like, even the ones that hate each other. But hey, remember the movie Wag the Dog? When the CIA figured out the lie that the main characters were perpetrating, they didn't call them out on it, or try to disprove the lie. They just altered the course of the lie.

So if you want GDs and IEs ruling the world in your games, I guess there's ample evidence for that. But there's also evidence that the most powerful regime the IEs could form was Tir Tairngire, and look how that turned out. And GDs don't control a single major government, and only one out of ten megacorps (I think that's right, it's hard to keep track of how many megas are around anymore). Any argument that IEs and GDs are in control is going to have to rely on "behind the scenes" influence, which is ENTIRELY up to your individual campaign.

because intellect can't help you find a solution that doesn't exist, neither can experience, and magic can't reach far enough--and, over all of that, there are too many other players of roughly equal power to contend with.

GDs are really powerful. but they're not as powerful as you seem to think we think they are. it's like we're saying "this guy over here, he can jump really, really high", and you're saying "well if he can jump so high, why can't he just fly?"

I just have to nitpick here: Lofwyr is not just a GD who is the CEO of a mega. He owns the world's largest mega. No shareholder meetings, no proxy battles, no board of directors to control, he just owns the whole damn thing. In terms of actually exercising control this makes a huge amount of difference due to the way corporate administration works.
He's the wealthiest being on the planet. And he's a Great Dragon that has been shown deference by other GDs and is globally renowned as one deceptive and dangerous motherfucker. He's a scary dude. The fact that Damien Knight rolls on his level is merely further evidence that Knight's also a scary dude.

Eh, the dragons and elves have always been the most love it or hate it aspect of Shadowrun.

I love elves and dragons...
I hate infallible being...
I really didn't like the Tirs until I heard they bit the dust...
I love it when the infallible fail...

However, as to GD and IE controlling the world...
No one controls the world, because there are too many being (be they elves, humans, dragons, or even corporate entities) are trying to do just that...
I don't even think Lofwyrs control of his "own private little mega™" is as absolute as Kyrn makes it seem...
I believe Lofwyr makes it seem absolute, just as the elves want to make it seem like they control the world...

Its Shadowrun Marmite.

Personally I think that they are big movers and shakers but so are quite a few other things... Plus everyone knows its the horrors that are in the background controlling everything getting ready for their return

It's good and comforting to think that not even Lofwyr has absolute control over a giant organization like Saeder Krupp. But In-Game sources tend to claim otherwise. He might not react to everything instantly, but he seems to be aware of everything going on and reacts in time in his own way.

IT is true, the fluff agrees with you...
But as I said, I hate infallibility, so in my games I AM THE FLUFF! (No one quote me on that, please...)

For what its worth (approximated 2 ), here's my very non-canon take on IEs. Take it with a grain of salt.

• Immortal Elves are a myth. An urban legend. A fairy tale that the Elven Identity wankers tell each other before bedtime. Sperethiel isn't some uber ancient language, its a mishmash of Tolken's made up elf languages with really good PR spin (Elven Identity types claim Tolken leanred the language from the IEs, though).
• Also, there is no connection between ED and SR as far as I'm concerned. Sure, there are some similarities, but as far as I'm concerned ED is not SR's 4th world.

As far as Dragons are concerned, I don't stray much from the canon.

Dragons are some ofthe most intelligent, individually powerful beings in the 6th world, regardless of whether they're "Great" or not. Dragons have access to vast personal resources, centuries or millenia of experience, and are cults of personality, attracting the easily coerced and power hungry. Despite all the resources and power at their disposal, they're still mortal beings. They can be killed. There are things that they do not know and you can catch them off guard (sometimes). Most importantly, they can only be in one place at a time, so they rely on their metahuman (and spirit and paracritter) minions to get things done.

I'm willing to accept that the dozen or two Greats in the world are as uber powerful as they're made out to be. Well, more or less. They're still mortal beings and could be killed if you 1) caught them off guard, 2) wanted to tip your hand to your rivals/enemies/competition, and 3) didn't mind making enemies of just about every other dragon in the world, as well as numerous free spirits, paracritters, and dragon cultists. The fight itself might not even be that hard, but the political and social fallout would likely haunt you for years or decades to come. Assuming you didn't get killed for your troubles.

Corporations and Governments probably treat dragons like they view any other cult of personality figure with a personal army. Potentially dangerous, but probably not a huge problem unless they start getting crazy. Probably best to not antagonize them.

No can do, mister.

LOL I'da quoted just the "I AM THE FLUFF" portion, myself.

I fail to see where Lofwyr is infallible. Just because he's ultra smart and knows practically everything going on in his lair (i.e. S-K), doesn't mean he does not get boned from time to time. I don't know how often people stole nuclear weapons from him, but it happend so often, it's not even funny anymore. Also, see what happend in Frankfurt with Nachtmeister. Lofwyr actually had to piss him off so much, so he could kill him in combat, because he was outmaneuvered on corporate level mostly by regular people. Not very infallible.

I don't even like the sound of this word. Infallible. Meh.

...ok on a more serious note.

Paws2Sky: I like your take particularly on ED --> SR ties. Pretty close to the way I see it.

Again, though they do not appear directly in my campaigns, the Dragons are still there in the background where they ought to be. PCs and Dragons, any Dragons usually don't mix well. Basically in a toe to toe, the Dragon always wins unless the GM isn't running her correctly.

The IEs had their chance with the TT & royally (pun well intended) screwed the proverbial canine. Between them and the Dragons, I see IEs as wannabes at best. In some ways this does makes them more dangerous to the rest of the 6th world than Dragons, as they seem to have something yet to prove.

Dragons, know their tough. IEs only think they're tough.

...my two Zloty's worth.

My own personal take on Ghostwalker? He surprised people. AND, he hit an area that kept most of the heavy military gear out of it, hit non-military tagets, and in a heavily urban area. You COULD ask: How is it that the U.S. military has not totally suppressed the insurgents in Baghdad, since, really, what Ghost Walker did was kind of on a par with that on a larger scale. We know the military cannot deal with Guerilla warfare. It was not able to effectively deal with it in Vietnam, in Somalia, or in Baghdad,what makes anyone think it could deal with it 70 years from now? Now, in a stand up fight? Ghostwalker would have been toast.




Lofwyr is, indeed, fallible. There are plenty of instances in the novels of his subbordinates doing things he did not tell them to do, which have led to errors, and he has not actually done anything about it that we ever saw. The fact that, as someone pointed out, his Dragon rival in Europe was actually hurting him through the actions of meta-human subordinates, while Lofwyr, generally, seems to rely on the "Micro-managing everything I can" approach. I really get the feeling that Lofwyr does not trust his own people to do their jobs, which is always a mistake.

Then again, my take on the Great Dragons is: for all their power, there are ALWAYS blind spots. Nothing is invulnerable. Nothing is infallible. Actually, I tend to think of the Great Dragons as bit like Xanatos from Gargoyles: Their plans DO get foiled. They just take away lessons from those foilings, if they are not so arrogant as tot hink they are perfect. Lofwyr, in fact, is even more fallible then most great dragons because he seems to think he IS perfect.

Well, uhh, no. No there isn't.

And the fact you can't seem to wrap your head around that is part of why everyone's getting so "I'm smacking my skull against a brick wall talking to this guy" right now. There isn't internal consistency in Shadowrun. There never really has been. I like to tell myself they've never really been trying for it. Instead, you get a game world so splintered into little pocket settings that it's obvious they're just trying to cover their bases -- "let's see, how can we make a setting that will let someone do __________, if they want to?" -- instead of trying to make an internally consistent world. The trick to enjoying it is to just roll with it, cherry pick the aspects you want to focus on, and try to quietly ignore the other equally-canon aspects that violently clash with your favorites.

Insisting that internal consistency exists doesn't make it so. It'd be nice if the setting was a little more consistent, sure. But it isn't, never has been, and (especially if projects continue being worked on by freelancers, a chapter at a time) probably never will be.

Man, I love being right without knowing it...

I said at the start of the other thread that Dev's work with "It's a dragon, it's cool" and not with logic. A lot of others however think there's this logical reason for something. Without internal consistency, that falls down like a house of cards.

The current devs do try to retrocon consistency in. At least sometimes. With mixed effects. I'd go with Critias' position. Throw out the parts that make you want to throw the sourcebook or the rules at a wall and keep the cool stuff.

Exactly what fits in either category will vary from person to person, and that's OK too.

Well, you don't even have to throw them out, necessarily. Just don't focus on them. Have them happening in your game all you want, let someone tie their background in with whatever they want to, yadda yadda yadda -- but you don't have to actively use it. I've never run anything, or played in anything, involving pirates and the Carib League (or whatever it's called). It doesn't directly influence my games, but that doesn't necessarily mean it's not there. It just hasn't mattered yet in any of my games.

I think the IE's and GD's are left over from when FASA was running the show.

Like I said in the Ghost Walker thread, FASA liked to have an uber "We can kill anything and anyone, and no one can say shit about it. Oh, and by the way... we know EVERYTHING! You may now bow down and worship us now." force. In Shadowrun it was the IE and GD. In Battletech it was the Clans. I never even looked at Earthdawn, but I think they most likely had an uber group in there... just to piss everyone off.

I haven't used any official metaplot since Corp War, so my personal game is fine for me and my group. Just sad I'll not be able to use most of whatever the devs put out after the rulebooks for 4E are done - but money saved, I guess.

I would imagine a lot of the setting book info would still be of value, even if you completely ignore almost any metaplots. Not sure how many people actually work the metaplot in anyway.

That said while it is valid to imagine things would happen differently to how the books portray it, and accuse people of insisting it has happened, the trouble is the original arguments were GW would be toasted like that for various reasons. This naturally creates an opposite reaction. Internal consistency or lack thereof works both ways

Let's get something clear here. As someone has already mentioned super-duper Great Dragons and Immortal Elves are indeed a hold-over from the FASA days.

Neither Rob nor I are really into the world-shaking metaplots that hinge on these overpowered beings playing with each other. In fact in the last three metaplots that have been developed (System Failure, Emergence, and the upcoming Ghost Cartels) the really dangerous movers and shakers were all too metahuman (well, with the exception of the three AI - but we offed them too). When we do visit these characters, we will be developing stuff that's more akin to Harlequin (the original) than Survival of the Fittest.

Given that there has not been a single development in any of the IE and GD-related plots in SR4 (either in sourcebooks or campaign books) since its release three years ago, given that the last big GD plot was Survival of the Fittest a FASA product that FanPro inherited along with Dragons of the Sixth World, given that in 4 plus years of FanPro we moved all the ED links into the background where they should be, and given that Catalyst has made it clear that we're veering towards a more street-level feel - I have no idea where you're coming from with a statement like that.

The SR4 non-rule books (including those planned for the next year or so) are:
Runner Havens (location book)
Emergence (campaign book)
Corporate Enclaves (location book)
Ghost Cartels (campaign book)
Vice (source book - working title for Underworld 2.0)
Awakened Haunts (location book)
unnamed plotbook (campaign book)
Corporate Guide (source book - Corp Download meets Corp Shadowfiles)
Cities of Intrigue (location book)
Strange Places (location book)

I thought it was clear. I said I haven't used any metaplot since "blood in the boardroom". No crash 2.0 (since the arcology was taken back from deus within 1 week in my campaign, I retconned the wireless matrix in the campaign as "It always was wireless"), no year of the comet, no surge, no emergence. No Leonardo, no astral rift, no shedim, etc. etc.

I am not a fan of "realm shattering events" (Crash 2.0) or "clichee threat of the week" (Shedim), and most of the rest was simply not adding anything to my game (which is currently set in the caribbean).

Instead of all the stuff I did not use, I use a lot of voodoo and free spirits in the magic part of the campaign, and some old school "totems/loas are real enough to take actions" garnish, take inspirations from non-SR modern fantasy novels for plots and developments (like for shifters or vampires), lots of tech/media stuff (currently the runners are involved in shooting a simsense flick, next up is procuring new toys from the military), some pirate/smuggling action, university and local politics, lots of mafia-related plots, and general action movie style stuff.

So far, the official sourcebooks simply had not what I wanted for my campaign since they either overdid it (shedim, I prefer less world-wide, large-scale threats), or involved stuff I had no interest in (technomancers).

The Shedim are a good example for that. I'd have liked some local threat, maybe some area somewhere where the dead and soulless bodies can get possessed by evil spirits. But world wide? No thanks. And if I have to rewrite the shedim to find reasons why they are not spreading past a certain area, then I can as well take something from non-SR sources and adapt it, less work.

Now, if the coming books focus more on locations, and settings, and less on the next shedim/crash/surge/astral rift gimmick, then they might be very useful. I really like the 4E sourcebooks so far. If they have more small-scale, local stuff, less "the entire world is shaken by this COOL event!" attitude, if they have more plot hooks to start runs with, less stories to read about what happened between uber-NPCs, then they'll be bought by me for sure.

But I can really do without more of the world-wide metaplot stuff on a scale like Shedim, Surge, Crash 2.0, etc.

Fuchs..how do you explain the Technomancers, then? Or do you just say they don't exist? Or, so you still say they lose their powers at 13?

I don't have technomancers in my campaign.

So, according to you, technology and military kick ass, but an AI, using advanced technology and military, coordinating and motivating them on a level not known to man, dug into an arcology, get's hosed? Now, that makes perfect sense. You bashing the devs for inconsistecy and "because I said so" is quite ironic right now.

It's an AI holed up in an arcology. No way to hide, no way to escape. The Army and Renraku simply poured more firepower and manpower into the arcology, before the AI had consolidated its hold. Expensive, and costly, and a lot of soldiers, security, and civilians died, but they took the arcology back.

Of course, if you wait until the AI has had time to fortify and produce soldiers and drones, then you'll face a much direr challenge. But even so - the ressources of either Renraku or the UCAS dwarf it.
But in my campaign, Renraku and the UCAS military went in within hours of the arcology closing down, and did not stop until they had full control - too much was at stake for either party. Spec Force teams secured the reactors early on. And neither side has that many qualms about losses as our current military has. They think more WW1/WW2 - what has to be done has to be done, Ohama beach style if needed.

Yes, the military kicks ass in my campaign. Holing up in a bunker won't stop them. Inflicting losses won't stop them if the mission is as important as saving an entire arcology, as well as an entire city (if the rectors go critical). Combine them with a megacorp, and there's not much that will stop them. A single AI in a single building, even one as big as an arcology, is no match for an alliance of Renraku and the UCAS military.

Without a way to escape an attack and move away or hide within a population against an enemy unwilling to sacrifice said population, there's not much that can stand against an army apart from another army. And Deus had no army. He might have had something similar to a small army, if given months to "recruit" and fortify. He was not given months. He was not even given days in my campaign. A few hours, then the assault began because neither Renraku nor the UCAS could risk waiting any longer.

Internally consistent with my campaign, yes.

(And if anyone mentions that there was just the Metroplex Guard: In my campaign, Seattle has a sizable Naval presence, including marines. And there was nothing stopping the UCAS army from flying in a rapid reaction force of brigade-size or more, not with a megacorp applying their own pressure. The NAN was not willing to grandstand, not with three reactors in danger of going critical almost within their own lands.)

Sorry, but none of that is clear when you say you "haven't used any metaplot since Corp War." Neither in the post I quoted, nor any of the previous ones in this thread, nor for that matter have any of your recent posts clarified to any degree the level to which you tweak the canon setting for your campaign. You made a blanket statement to the effect that you would "not be able to use most of whatever the devs put out after the rulebooks for 4E are done" in the context of a thread where you and others have been discussing the IEs and GD involvement in the canon setting.


I've listed the non-rule books on the schedule, so you tell me. You're the one who said he wouldn't buy SR4 books because of the development direction chosen...


This is where we have a disconnect. You made a statement regarding why you wouldn't be buying future SR4 books based apparently on what you believe the line developers' direction appears to be - however, that belief seems to be completely unfounded by any of the SR4 books that have been released.

Even Emergence - which is as close as we've come to a world-shaking event - features no uber-NPCs at all, a huge number of small-scale plot hooks, myriad local developments, loads of stories about street-level characters, and the introduction of at least one entirely new setting element (non-uber Artificial Intelligences).


Of those metaplots you have mentioned only the Crash 2.0 was developed by the people currently in charge of the setting and while you may not like the scope and world-shaking ramifications of the event - we believe it was a fitting conclusion to SR3, wrapped a bunch of storylines and set the stage for the necessary changes we wanted to implement in the canon setting. All that and the bad guys were "just" human (for the most part).

In the dev chat, the devs said they'd focus on the metaplot, after the rules were complete with Unwired. That's what I was going from. If they instead focus on settings and locations, then of course it's a much different picture. And the books you listed do sound good, but titles can be misleading.

But if I hear "metaplot", I wince.

Again, you can do whatever bakes your cookie in your campaign - however, in the canon version of the storyline (the one other people use as reference) Deus only made his move when he already had an army (of drones and Whites), when he was fortified, and when he had absolute control of the reactors. He also ensured he had 100,000 hostages by locking down the arcology exactly when he did. Given those circumstances the canon resolution of events is entirely plausible and internally consistent. Even were the military to write off the hostages, they would not have moved if such an operation endangered the rest of Seattle. Renraku suffering from several Corp War blows already couldn't afford the doubly negative PR either.


When the devs speak of the developing metaplots, we're talking about stuff like Emergence and the upcoming Ghost Cartels, maybe the something about Horizon, or the new AIs, possibly the follow-up on the New Revolution story, or the coup in Tir Tairngire. Those are the metaplots that have been featured to one extent or another in SR4 books. As I have said above we might very well revisit the IEs and GDs in future metaplots, but if we do so in sourcebooks it'll be closer to the original Harlequin than Survival of the Fittest.

You may not have noticed but metaplot development also takes place in the location books.

I think I made it clear enough that I dislike such "and he was so prepared already, no one could do anything" plots, so of course I'll not use them in my campaign. And the call about hostages can go either way, same for the threat to Seattle. So, neither action nor inaction is inherently more logical.