I'm probably way off topic with with this one (still waiting patiently for GC hardcopy preorder so can join in on the proper thread), but a friend happened to come up with several boxes of old gaming stuff I thought lost forever. And in one of those boxes a few of my Earthdawn books. Just got me wondering again why not? Certainly ways to explain an early awakening, been done before with the "enemy" and I was never a huge fan of surge or YotC could had added them then instead of trying to fake em with surge (when I say faked em, I mean me not the devs). After seeing the "windling" show up in first paranormal critters of Europe book I always expected to see the others eventually. Maybe just wishful thinking but from my perspective I much rather would have made up a T'Skrang Pc instead of a Centaur or Naga.

Biased choices. Please reword them so that people who like "other games" but don't want T'Skrang in SR have a valid answer.

I like the wording myself.

*EDIT*

Before the change that is...

Sorry about that final choice has been edited to sound less negative towards those who might dislike the idea. It was a bit of bias on my part to be a little too negative before seeing any replies. Hope it can reflect a proper choice now.

Original phrase mentioning the "hate" of IE's and crossover info was a direct response for those who have made it rather clear on dumpshock there dislike for that setting and crossovers stuff in general. I caved and removed/edited that choice because in all honesty not everyone has read or has an opinion on that thread so thanks to Fuchs for making me think twice and be a little more level headed. I did like the wording though.

As one of my players put it: "If I want to play D&D, I play D&D. I don't want to play D&D in SR". (We play a weekly D&D and a weekly SR campaign together.)

i voted why the hell not . .
if it's the natural order of appearance, then they will reappear sooner or later anyway
obsidimen ould probably get me to play SR4 or 5 *snickers*

No!

SR is already a crossover game. Tech and Sorcery instead of Swords and Sorcery if you will. If play style demands it certainly play down the fantasy setting or try out one of the great old pure cyberpunk games that started the genre. But if you came to SR in the beginning due to its mix of fantasy and tech, you certainly don't see any reason to tame down either. I don't see adding a few more races that by all accounts belong to the canon history of and will arrive eventually in the cycle causeing the game to tilt any more in the "sword" direction. You can play a troll, centaur or make up big bird or elephant man using surge but playing a canon race makes it D&D, that I don't really understand.

Edit: Fixed my double "nn's" spasm in canon.

"Canon."

xoxoxoxo,
Wes the Pedant

No to the post or no to 5th edition. hehe

If we're talking canon history, we 'lost' a couple of Races during the previous Down Cycle. I have no problem writing off those two Races during the most recent one.

No to T'Skrang and Obsidimen!

I can see the argument for not wanting them I guess its just the addition of the windling and some of silliness you can make with surge has me wistfully wishing for the others that "feel" like a better fit for me personally.

T'skrang and Obsidimen are not SR canon races, never were. Besides, anyone wanting to play a lizard can easily have bodymods to achieve the look, and for those wishing to play obsidimen, there are free spirits.

The past of Shadowrun was never truly explained until after the Earthdawn tie in. Theres was never an alternate past that was replaced by Earthdawns past. So yes it was a canon past that was a few years after release day but then again there was never a "what came before" section in 1st edition to contradict it either. It's like saying we just discovered Atlantis yesterday so it can't possibly have existed prior it's discovery.

T'Skrang and Obsidimen never were canon races in SR. No official SR book ever listed them as canon races.

Why would there be prior to there "awakening". I mean certainly you can ignore all of the allusions to Earthdawn tie ins if you don't like them but for someone who does use the tie ins as given by the creators and developers of the game, I guess I'm am curious as to these races ultimate end.

Fuchs, you remember Year of the Comet? Weren't there a corporate-shark/japanise-traditionalist/bigot (yeah a true [bip]) that surged into something that in System Failure (or at least I think was there) was described as a giant of rock? Maybe Obsidimen are about to come.

IIRC There was a mention of something similar in SoAsia.

Basic metatypes are cool. They are integrated in the world in a way that makes them very interesting (prejudices towards metatypes being the same as some of today's prejudices for example).
Metavariants make sense, in a way: if metatypes are folkloric characters, it makes sense that characters from other cultures will appear too. Their integration in the game world isn't too hard since they are just local variants of existing metatypes.

But other sapients metacreatures are harder to fully integrate to Shadowrun. I can accept fairies and centaurs in some forest in Europe, for example, but they don't fit in the Sprawls and I don't see how you can have them in numbers in the Sprawl without slipping from a dystopic/cyberpunk with magic tones to "the magic realm of Shadowrun". There's a reason why Shadowrun's ork aren't stupid green humanoid creatures with a taste for killing humans.
That's why I have trouble envisioning T'skrang in Shadowrun.

I think this deserves me dusting off The Last Liferock short story one of these days.

I don't mind.

Please dust.

Can I sneeze?

*achew*

I'd vote for "Not yet"... I'd say that the Manalevel is much to low for T'krang or Obsidimen if somebody want's an explanation.

They have a certain nice feeling from the concept, but it's really something for an extra companion or stuff. More like a RC for an RC.

Mah, no matter.. the Windlings will be dead in no time anyway, you cannot expect a race that has a 10 to 1 birthratio of males and stay monogamous for their entire life to survive can you?

I have no problem with that.

Now if we can just get to work on the trolls ... and orks ... and dwarves.

Elves first.

Yes or No.

No, in that they shouldn't be common or even officially recognized, yes in that there should be tantalizing hints and possibilities for individual GMs to run with.

Unless, of course, they have Jesus Christ: Vampire Hunter and his Obsidiman sidekick dual wielding enchanted ice and fire scimitars against the Persian Army from 300 now led by Cyborg Hitler while giant smoke-belching gasoline-powered cyberzombies with full-auto modified Panther Assault Cannons and jetpacks fly over the battlefield shooting up both sides.
That would just be too awesome not to make canon. If the Obsidiman is played by Sean Connery and wears a kilt.

Didn't they usually have only one child per couple too?

10 to 1 of males = a single female for 10 males?
Maybe they follow a rebirt cycle in which windling birthed ar only female while males simply appear uot of nowhere and live just to fu...ehmm allow females to give birth. In this cycle a dead windling may come back by birth and be female or by what-is-called-appearing-out-of-nowhere, females would be the dominant caste obviviously.
Man males must have some seriously pathological level of sexual frustration.

While id be open for the T'skrang to show up soon, I would personally prefer that the writes would wait a couple of more decades (gametime in the sixthworld) before introducing the obsidimen since it takes quite high levels of magic for them to emerge from the living rocks as far as i remember from the old earthdawn books.

I love that the windlings were reintroduced into the game with Runner's companion, and I hope to see both the T'skrang and the Obsidimen make it into the sixth world!

T'be fair, pixies were introduced /waaay/ back in Paranormal Animals of Europe as "sprites." Names were changed to protect the inn...er, prevent confusion with technomancer terminology.

Yeah, and now there's confusion on a mix of laes and novacoke.

You would perhaps be more accurate to mean a confusion between the wee winged critters and one of the popular derogatory names for elves, which is what said admixture of terrible chemicals is named after. Howsome'er, being as pixies do greatly resemble small winged elves, and that the popular name pixie dust more generally derives from the metaphorical expansion of the insult to its roots, e.g. that wing'd faeries have magical dust that drops from their wings to enchant and glamour-ize mortals, it is apt enough in this instance not to cause more confusion than absolutely necessary.

Hmmm could have named them Windlings? I mean heck there must be a translation for there race in old elven...maybe even in that Or'zet codex thats floating around. Maybe a few dragons flitting about as well that might know more about there proper name and origins.

Issues on issues, there. On the one paw, you have the fact that Windlings is a distinctly Earthdawn term, and despite the friendliness between the two companies producing ED and SR at the moment it might be seen askance to steal such a distinct name - or perhaps not <shrug>. More importantly, there's no basis for importing the name into SR unless one or more of the IEs or GDs (or, who knows, the pixies themselves) decide to make an issue of it...and why would they bother? The pixies have their own names for themselves (case in point: the Korrigan) and whatever they actually call themselves, the world-at-large will always seize on whatever name catches the public imagination (as anyone who studies languages can attest).

Bravo, I do appreciate a fellow rationalizer!

Wait are you saying that SR has a race of miniature zerg queens running around? Awesome..
Edit: Oh Kerrigan.. my bad, it still would be awesome for halloween and put an entirely new twist on pixies , I always liked it darker and grittier anyway

I don't have a problem with new (or old as it may be) critters or races. Just more toys to play with IMHO.

Positive Metagenic Qualities (30):
Raptor Beak
Claws
Prehensile Tail
Thermal Sensitivity

Negative Metagenic Qualities (5):
Scales
(+10 or more BP more ...)

Maybe the T'Skrang are already hiding among the changelings ...