If you where going to recommend three sourcebooks to someone who never played SR4. What would they be and why?

I'm a 2E player and have no idea where to start besides the main handbook.

BBB (of course)
street magic
arsenal

BBB,
Unwired,
Street Magic
more like it, all 3 Worlds covered . .
Arsenal and Aug are more important to me, because i am a gadgeteer ^^

BBB (Core book) of course. Rest depends what the player likes to play...

Basic book
Arsenal (additional equipment for all characters)
Runner Heavens

+ archetype specific books like Unwired (hackers) or Streetmagic (mages)

I agree with Mickle5125

but it may depends of the type of game he will be running ...
if it is low on magic and high on cyber he may replace Street Magic by Augmentation...

the big black book is the base and after every core book (Street Magic, Arsenal, Augmentation and in the future Unwired) is required as soon as you need to advance in a domain (in the order magic, weapons, cyber and matrix)


the other background supplements are less important as at the beginning you will need to understand the huge variation between the 2nd ed era and the 4the ed era (the wifi matrix, ... ) before looking for Runners Haven and Corporates Enclaves.

Unsurprisingly all the core rulebooks will probably be useful but here's a rundown:

The SR4 core book (aka the BBB) - Because, you know, it's the core book.
Arsenal - All the cool gear and vehicles that you really need for just about every purpose you can think of.

And depending on what strikes the person's interest in the core book:
Street Magic - The advanced magic book is pretty much essential for magician characters, but you can get by with the core book to begin with.
Augmentation - What Street Magic does for magicians, Augmentation does for all the wired and augmented types, but again you can get by with the core book to begin with.
Unwired - The advanced Matrix sb may seem odd since it's a new release (and only out in pdf), but a lot of people have a harder time absorbing the implications and rules for AR and the wi-fi Matrix than any other facet of SR4, since this extends beyond hackers to all character types it's a pretty important topic. Unwired helps put things into perspective, though it might be a little steep learning curve for beginners.

I'd actually put Unwired at a pretty low level for the average person just getting into Shadowrun. Yes, it's an excellent book, and with an experienced group it's very important book! But it's an added complexity.

I would say, for the true Newbies: BBB, Arsenal, and Augmentation.

All three of those can be used by anyone that isn't a Mage, Adept, Hacker, or Technomancer (Which adds complexity again). Let the Newbies play a Face, Muscle, Street Sami, or other Non-Specialist 'Runner first to learn the base system, then learn the extras as they go.

I mean, hell, it's not like they won't be going through characters left, right, and centre.

Thanks for all the input. Personally, I always placed cyber before magic and then the matrix. What about the GM screen? How much does it really help? As a former GM and DM I used it mostly to hide my dice rolls.

Personally, I don't use the official GM screen, I always have my own tables with me. Traditionally, there are better "cheat sheets" out there than the official ones...

Arsenal is a pretty versatile book. Sure, there's weapons in it for sams, and vehicles for riggers, but almost every character has a weapon, and many have vehicles. And the rest of the stuff in Arsenal, like all the electronics stuff, tools, etc. is also pretty ubiquitous.

The second book would probably be augmentation. You'd think augmentation would be pretty niche, only for cybered players, but it really has something for everyone. Many dumpshockers get a trauma dampener/platelet factories for their magicians as a matter of course to help with drain. There's some good matrix related headware for hackers like the Simsense Booster, Encephalon, Math SPU. There's bodysculpting stuff for faces. And there's lots of other fun things you can do with augmentation, like create a crazy building climber. Also, there's many fun drugs and compounds rules to get creative with.

With apologies to Synner, and any other Catalyst / Wizkids staff and freelancers for the following rant:

It's one of the worst GM screens ever made. The cardstock is flimsy and barely stands up on the table, the artwork is recycled and not particularly well laid out, and there are some extremely questionable choices in terms of what was included on the screen. The Assensing table, despite being one of the most oft-referenced tables in the game, is relegated to a seperate booklet (and a page in, so you can't just keep the booklet beside you), whilst a full set of stats for melee weapons has inexplicably been included on the screen in the space that the Assensing table could have filled.

Why melee weapons? Why do we need that? Just the Improvised Weapons part, that I could understand, since improvised weapons tend to be a spur of the moment thing, but why give me stats for a Mono-Whip on the GM screen? If you're going to do that, why haven't you included stats for an Ares Predator? I'm pretty sure I'll use those more than I'll use the stats for a Mono-Whip.

As for the included booklet; the adventure generator is kinda fun, but not exactly world shatteringly useful, the SR3 to SR4 conversion rules have already been put up on the Shadowrun website, so no value for money there (and hardly something you need to bring to every session), and the only genuinely worthwhile part of the book is the expanded list of Contacts, which gives you a bunch of cool NPC stats to use during play.

Definitely not worth the price-tag, and doesn't come close to comparing in value or quality with the likes of the Dark Heresy GM's screen, or any of the gorgeous White Wolf screens.

OK, /rant, I'm done now.

Shadowrun Core Book
Snowcrash by Neal Stephenson
Big Trouble in Little China DVD

All you've needed in any edition.

-Frank

I still use my SR3 gm screen which came free with a bundle of bits, but it has loads of stuff paperclipped to it

I have the SR4 GM screen. I've found it pretty useful (especially for ranges) but I don't imagine that more experienced GMs than I would.

I like the GM screen as well. I haven't found it flimsy at all.

But, now that you mention the lack of the assensing table (which I use all the frickin' time), the screen would be so much better if it was there instead of the melee weapons.

Heh. True Newbies or not, I'm ready to bet at least one player or two will be hell-bent on playing an Awakened character, and the average player is somewhat more willing to give up extra choice of equipment before extra choice of powers, so I reckon the true indispensables are: BBB, Augmentation, and Street Magic. To a somewhat lesser degree Unwired, then Arsenal.