Not sure the arguments stands up to inspection - we only have one Earth and they're happy to try their own breeding program there!

Granted, its established they already have their own space station with a viable biosphere. It would make far more sense to conduct their experiments there where they can just blow up the station if the shit hits the fan.

I was just speculating. Mars would have more complications since it is now contested but multiple megas...

- J.

I think that Shadowrun in space would appeal to those who want more of a traditional cyberpunk feel, i.e., without magic. There would obviously be more of a focus on technology, and stealth, but if you managed to deal with the security forces on a space station, it might be hours, days, or even weeks, before security could have back up arrive. And, stealth in spaceships might be easier. Imagine the equivalent of a modern stealth fighter in space. At a few hundred kilometers, you won't see it without help, and that help is being evaded by the stealth. Shadowrun science doesn't have any mystical sensors like most space opera shows. Catching movement across the background of stars would be quite difficult, even with 2070 technology.

So, your team comes in quiet, jams communications, and clamps on. They have only minutes before the onboard security team figures out what is happening. In that time, you have to get inside and strike, or plant a drone to do your dirty work later. Drones can only get you so far, though, because, with the distances involved, there will be delays in communications. If you overcome the security, you have a few hours, then you can drift off into the darkness.

Otherwise, false IDs can get you in, and it becomes a spygame of lies and intrigue, with time running out. False IDs will only get you so far in high tech, high security places in space.

what happened again to the Dragon Skeleton on Mars ?

JahtaHey
Medicineman

Faked.

- J.

The Eden node on the Daedalus space station is the ideal place for Ares' Hive runs for a few reasons. One, it's out of the way. It's not likely that other megacorps are going to sniff around Daedalus and discover Ares' program, whereas on Mars there are multiple corporations jockeying for control and that's a bit too much company for comfort. Second, Ares understands the risk of ritual links running to the Hive: something could follow them back. It's pretty convenient that the Eden node is designed to be detached from the rest of Daedalus and sent out into the void of space if there's any sign that something has come back through from the Hive.

I had the thought of introducing reasons to go to the Mars site with my group. I was planning on making the apparent red color of Mars due to ridiculously high amounts of naturally occuring orichalcum, and I was going to have insect spirits there as the norm, not suffering from Evanescence (it's their home planet), while 'normal' summoned spirits have to worry about evanescence.

Well, while SR Space would be really cool, it wouldn't work yet. You can't go to Mars without the Moon. The Moon would be the test and staging area for any serious colonization projects on Mars. However a few arcologies on the Moon would be nice.

That's what I was alluding to.

Two questions:
1) Did you write that section?
2) What are your thoughts on SR in Space?

- J.

Yes, I did.



Conflicted. On one hand, it's cool and I'd love to see space setting material in Shadowrun. On the other hand, I know that would be hard to write. Compared to the sprawl settings, space locations are small, isolated, distant from each other, tightly corp-controlled and Awakened-unfriendly. It's going to be difficult to write that material into a campaign setting a group could use, at least from the space locations currently detailed.

First, count me as a very enthusiastic supporter of a book on space in Shadowrun.


In my opinion a space sourcebook should not have its settings watered down to make it playable for most campaigns. Rather it should be seen as an opportunity to showcase a alternate style and/or high-level campaigns. So describe the settings as the are (or should be), and then add a chapter on making the kinds of characters that would run up there. I have played a Shadowrun Merc. campaign. I know of more than one Shadowrun campaign based on playing from the side of law enforcement. (one based on playing semi-corrupt street cops, and one based on CSI).

I could see a gritty campaign for an astronaut-trained corporate strike team, or a lighthearted but high-level Armageddon-esque game.

Yeah, give us more then Shadowrunners. Those alternate Campaigns weren't without reason in the SR3 compendium.
I just love the idea of not playing a Shadowrunner in Shadowrun, since the world is 1) richer and 2) you can actually use those alternative character concepts without raping the respectively background.

Exactly!


Don't forget DocWagon campaigns. Those have been a popular alternative for... a long time. (Since the original Shadowrun Companion, maybe?)


Let's not forget Firefly/Serenity. Yes, the tech isn't quite there yet, but its really freakin' close.

There's lots of potential here to stretch the bounds of the game. Solid, comprehensive space rules could lead to all kinds of unusual, interesting campaigns.

-paws

Even considering alternate campaign styles, it's still hard to write. The space locations are small: even the largest corp-owned space assets have populations of just a few hundred people. And there's still all that space between them to transverse, and space travel in Shadowrun isn't inexpensive or easy to acquire, even if you work for a megacorp.

One of the problems with SR4, and I think Rob Boyle realised, is that it was leaving cyberpunk for transhumanism. The best decision Rob could have done, and did, is stop doing that, and just write Eclipse Phase.

As such, if somone wanta a workable gritty space setting, said person should stop trying to warp Shadowrun and buy Eclipse Phase when it comes out.

Frank had us playing Corp employees on Mars. Most of the NPCs were even crazier than the PCs, and the NPCs were doing seriously crazy stuff. My character was the chief engineer, whose PhD was on building improvised fusion bombs....

I agree that if what someone is looking for, is primarily a near future space game, that Eclipse Phase is probably the way to go (and I will be happily buying it when it comes out).

But... I really do want a more detailed and comprehensive description of space (and the Moon, Mars etc.) in Shadowrun just as much.

If the material really only warrants a writeup under the size of a module, than just sell it as an e-book. But if it takes more pages than that, make it a sourcebook with an alternate campaign angle (not a different world, just different types of characters)

You forgot one thing heat. A ship would glow in the emptyness of space due the heat it would emit as IR radiation. You dont need mystical sensors when a themographic cam would do the job. If how ever you can summon a spirit high enough force to use concealment in space then your set.

Or stick heat sinks in the hull and use a laser to radiate the heat toward empty space. Boom, (thermally) invisible spaceship.

Or just use cryoarithmetic engines and dispense with the laser.

What's the background count of space anyway? Just how high force would the spirit have to be?

Except you have technomancers. Their power works no matter the mana level.

IIRC its a force 7 mana warp.
Also heat sinks would radiate heat. And its not just engine heat but also body heat and such.

Heat sinks collect heat so it can be transferred elsewhere... like a thermoelectric transducer powering a laser. Also, heat is heat is heat. Engine heat and body heat go the same place.

Lasers are great tools for converting about 10-15% of the input power to light. The other 85-90% they convert to heat.

Given that space has a background temp of 4 degrees K it's really hard to get something that cold and keep it that cold. Most of the ideas people talk about amount to having a light bulb illuminating a solar cell that powers the light bulb...

To steal the arguments of someone who has thought a lot about this:
http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/rocket3w.html

"Most of the arguments on thermo and space detection run through a predictable course of responses:
1) "Space is dark. You're nuts!"
2) "OK, there's no horizon, but the signatures can't be that bright?"
3) "OK, the drive is that bright, but what if it's off?"
4) "But it's not possible to scan the entire sky quickly!"
5) "OK, so the reactors are that bright, what if you direct them somewhere else..."
6) "What if I build a sunshade?"
7) "OK, so if I can't avoid being detected by thermal output, I'll make decoys..."
8) "Arrgh. You guys suck all the fun out of life! It's a GAME, dammit!" "

I'm so ashamed.

That series of arguments is by the guy who designed "Attack Vector" and "Saganami Island Tactical Simulator". Ken Burnside has heard them ALL before.

I find it's really helpful to understand how the world really works before you start fiddling with rules that people expect will more or less model it. If the actual reality isn't acceptable to a game (And it often can be used with minimal compromise) at least you know where and why you wrote up a load of technobable.

Deep Space (as in, between galaxies) is a -12 mana void. The moon's surface (as given on page 120, Street Magic) has a backround count of -9. So total, I'd say space is between a -9 and -12 mana void.

How precisely is that a problem? The SR universe has had upwards of 60+ years of constantly evolving weird shit going on. UGE, Goblinization, SURGE and now the technomancer Emergence have all changed what it means to be (meta)human, and that's not even counting cyber/bio/gene/nano-techs. A lot of that increasingly transhuman background is pre-SR4 as well, so it's not as if it's a new thing or a radical change in direction. The world evolves, the people and society evolve with it.

Heck that's even true in the real world. Not much pop culture cyberpunk being made is really of the old school pink mohawk/black hats and mirrorshades variety these days. Even the last Gibson thing I bothered to read was moving in that direction. Idoru had buildings "grown" by nanomachines and a guy looking to get hitced to an AI, those are just the elements I can remember off the top of my head...


As for the whole thermal damping in space thing, Anathem had an intruiging method (details of which escape me at the moment). I make no claims as to the scientific validity of said methods, but it made for an interesting plot device at least.

If you want to hide your thermal signature, all you have to do is move just in front of the sun. Old school air force tactic: Attack out of the sun.