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Bull
Ok, this is the thread where you tell us what kind of features and articles you are most interested in.

We have a couple very specific ideas of what we want to do with the magazine, and how we want to present it. But, not everything is set in stone, and we have a lot of wide open areas to play with. So let us know what kinds of things you would be most interested in reading about!
BlueMax
Simply put, Adventures.
If it had Adventures that were based in Seattle, I would shove money into your accounts.
Willing or not.

Several of the other options would be swell, especially the locations.


BlueMax
/srsly
Tachi
I wanna see it all!!!! You're an EVIL EVIL human being for making me choose only 3 options. nyahnyah.gif
Muspellsheimr
Except you where not limited to 3 options.

Or was that sarcasm? Difficult to tell with text.
Tachi
It says, "Please choose up to 3". Perhaps I could have chosen more, but I didn't cuz he said, "Please choose up to 3". Perchance I could have choosed all, but didn't cuz he said, "Please choose up to 3".

So, to reiterate yet again, I only chose 3. Now I R sarcastic. biggrin.gif

But seriously, I didn't realise that it was possible to choose more than three, else I would have done so. Unfortunately, I have now wasted my one vote by only choosing 3. Damn. (<not at all sarcastic this time)
Bull
THere doesn't seem to be a way to limit it to 3, so yeah, you can choose more than that, but I'd request you not. Generally, I'd assume that everyone wouldn't mind seeing all of thos e features, and we'll likely do them all at various points. However, I'm interested to see what features people MOST want to see. Thus the "Top 3".

So please, try to restrain yourself to only 3, and choose the 3 you'd be most interested in seeing. Thanks smile.gif
Ryu
I think I accidentially null-voted (donĀ“t post before the first coffee, I know). For the record I chose Fiction/New Stuff/Advice Columns.
Tachi
Thanks Bull, now I fell better about actually following directions, for once. (not sarcastic)
Method
This could get interesting.

Personally I voted for the crunchy bits because plug and play ideas would be most helpful to me. I also think that GM/Player advise columns would be wonderful. But like you said, Bull, any and all those options would be great. I think my ideal would be a variety zine with a wide range of different stuff each month, but a well developed adventure seed in every issue (and possibly themed gear, locations and NPCs that would fit in the adventure, but are otherwise stand-alone elements). I would encourage you not to lock yourselves into any rigid format.

BTW, who else is involved here? Who would be editing, etc.?
Muspellsheimr
So, I completely missed the line over the poll. I suggest you also include your 3-choice-limit in the OP, which I did read.
Bull
I'm still talking to folks a bit and lining things up. Right now it's mainly me (Editing/developing) and Caine Hazen (layout/graphic design). I talked to a bunch of folks at Gen Con, have a number of semi-non committal offers of help, etc etc. smile.gif

Don't worry, I'm not locking anything down too tightly. I'm mainly interested in seeing what has the most interest from the Dumpshock fanbase, for starters (i'm actually a little surprised at a couple of the numbers thus far), but in the end, the magazine will be open to any type of article for submission. But if the majority of folks want, say, Fiction, we'd be silly not to encourage folks to submit more fiction. Likewise, if NPC write ups aren't that requested, I wouldn't want to devote a lot of resources and page count toward them over top of something that people do want.

And of course, while this is currently being billed as a "DUmpshock Magazine" (Very likely not the final name), this is being published for all Shadowrun fans out there, and Dumpshock only represents a small slice of the fanbase. So things will grow and evolve as we get more feedback over time, and of course will be dependent on what kinds of submissions we get as well.
underaneonhalo
1) I chose cities specifically but I think any kind of location write ups would be awesome. Something like the old Seattle book, with locations of interest in a city and local gang profiles would be super neat.

2) Adventures would be great if they could be resolved over 3 or 4 issues.

3) I chose gear but dang it, now I'm kind of thinking about NPCs. I'd like to see stats for more NPC groups but I want me some guns and NERPS too!
Method
Well I can assure you that I am already plotting... muahaha!! devil.gif
Stahlseele
Alternate Rules For stuff that got left out of the books for example
GM and/or Player advice columns would be basically dumpshock to go
Locations (Individual, i.e. bars, offices, etc) are somewhat needed
Grinder
Locations, Adventures, NPCs - all the nice stuff that gives GMs many new ideas.
deek
I chose Alternate Rules, GM/Player Advice and New Gear.

The first two, would be most helpful to me and I think could be used immediately. And seeing there would be a review and editing process, what we would get in the magazine would hopefully be top notch stuff.

And who doesn't like new gear...guns, 'ware, vehicles and spells...can't go wrong there!
Prime Mover
Maybe broken into chapters like the core book.
1. PC/NPC write ups.
2.Magic, new spells,meta-magic,unique items....
3.Hacking, programs,options,security measures,AI's....
4.Toys, guns,cars,mods....
5.Coporate goodies,projects,security measures,maps of targets
6. Short write ups for one shot missions.
7.GM advice.
8.Critters
9.Fiction
10.Augmentations
Warlordtheft
QUOTE (Tachi @ Aug 18 2009, 12:28 AM) *
Thanks Bull, now I fell better about actually following directions, for once. (not sarcastic)



Ummmm...I voted all but the city bit. So I um um I guess I can't follow directions. blush.gif
Stormdrake
I followed instructions and picked just three but all of the listed interests would be very good. When may we see the first edition?
Kerrang
I would like to see almost all of these options incorporated into the zine, I chose Fiction, NPCs, and Individual Locations. If I had 4 choices I would have picked Adventures as well. The only one that really does not interest me at all is Alternate Rules.
Eugene
I'm most interested in fiction and adventures, followed equally by individual locations and NPCs. City writeups would be difficult to do well, I think (see city sketches in Runner Havens, etc.), unless the mag picked ONE city and then expanded it with lots of articles over time.

Opinion columns and new gear are the least interesting to me, personally. Dumpshock already has a whole lot of (cranky) opinions, and our group already doesn't use half the gear that's available. How many more 5P pistols or variations on the Bulldog does one really need?
DireRadiant
I want more of the Day in the Life type fluff. Like a lot of the stuff in the Neo Anarchist Guide to real Life. I would very much like the content to be material I can parcel out and hand to my players to assist in Immersion.
Method
DireRadiant: good call. You could include all kinds of player handouts: news faxes, adverts, social networking messages, etc.
CanadianWolverine
My top three from the list were:
1) Fiction
2) GM/Player Advice
3) Locations

This is from my experience of why I would buy and read the D&D magazines, Dragon iirc. Not on the list or notables I didn't choose in my top 3 would have been comic strips and gear. I choose Fiction because the fiction threads in this forum are among my favorite reads of all time and the SR novels is what originally got me interested in the P&P game. Next up would be the Art, good art on covers will sell, I know it sells me on Heavy Metal magazine. Other magazines I also purchase used to be PC Accelerator and PC Gamer (latest editions seem like a set back to me). I also purchase magazines based on the latest tech in home construction and hunting. I know the any Help Section would also be great for getting this newbie's head wrapped around the SR rules within the setting. The Locations (Cities) was picked because I am hugely curious about what happened with real life regions in the SR 2070 world, especially my home of Vancouver Island in BC, Canada.

I hope this helps better understand what would make me a customer of such a product. Oh, and I also read online magazines/articles too, mostly about PC gaming, such as The Escapist. Best of luck in your endeavors and again, I hope this helps.
Kerenshara
QUOTE (Method @ Aug 18 2009, 12:39 AM) *
Personally I voted for the crunchy bits because plug and play ideas would be most helpful to me.

That should be written Crunchy BitsTM. You owe me a nickel. *grin*
HappyDaze
QUOTE
in the end, the magazine will be open to any type of article for submission.

this is being published for all Shadowrun fans out there


In that case, I'm all for SR-setting conversions to alternate game systems. I've already got a handful fleshed out in the last week, and it wouldn't take me too long to make them presentable.
Shinxy
I'd like to see things I can lift out of the mag and plug into my games. I like to improvise, I never use full, published adventures, so I'd be looking for bits and pieces to use on the fly- locations, characters, equipment... oh and just articles on fleshing different parts of the game out.
Kronk2
A rotating selection of all of the highest quality of each would be cool. This would give each "team" about 2 months to prep and publish their material. Personally I think this place IS a rolling opinion column.
cndblank
Plug and play is good.

Short adventure scenes with stats that can be dropped in to an ongoing campaign are very useful especially if it is easy to pull the NPC Stat text so that the GM can customize the difficulty level.


I would like to see game mechanics on the fiction (NPCs, game mechanic examples, locations,...)
Bull
OK, letting this drop off. Time to move on to another poll smile.gif
Chrome Tiger
Personally, I always like extra gear, spells, locales, specific locations, and corporate/organizational profiles. Maybe some new critters and baddies.
Straight Razor
this is a comment on getting customer opinion.
You usually get a more definitive resonance if you ask the customer "which do you like the least" people freek out when there asked there favorite but quick to point out there least liked.

sorry i work with too many life time salesman.
the_real_elwood
I'm a bit of a gear-whore, so of course I'd like to see more gear. And the equivalent spells or adept powers for the magic types.

The other thing that really gets me interested is the locations, especially cities. Though if you do it in a magazine form, it's still gotta have the related shadowtalk.
Bull
RIght now the idea is that we'll have two sections of the Magazine: Bull's VPN, which is pure in character stuff (IC stories, shadowtalk about stuff, etc) and the Crunch Section, which will be stats, "regular" fiction, adventures, stuff like that.
nezumi
Bugger, forgot you're doing SR4 only. Any chance of my being able to revote? nyahnyah.gif
ravensmuse
Would NPC and location write-ups be good? I've been thinking of submitting the notes I'm using for a one-on-one game I'm doing, which would expand media and pop culture within SR.

Do you think it would be possible to talk Catalyst into letting us write a State of the Art 2072 or such biggrin.gif
HappyDaze
QUOTE
Bugger, forgot you're doing SR4 only.

Is this actually specified? I thought Bull said it was for all SR fans. That would include those that don't jive with SR4.
Bull
QUOTE (HappyDaze @ Aug 24 2009, 12:21 PM) *
Is this actually specified? I thought Bull said it was for all SR fans. That would include those that don't jive with SR4.


It is, to a degree. Even if you're not playing SR4, there's still a lot of SR4 material that is usable in an SR3 (or 2, or even 1) game. Just the crunchy stuff doesn't really apply. However, the rules and game world for the Magazine will be SR4 timeline stuff.

I hate to say it, but unfortunately we can't cater to the rather severe minority of players who haven't made the transition. There should be plenty of info and concepts and ideas that can be cribbed for an older edition game... Fiction should be enjoyable regardless of edition. Location and NPC write-ups are still useful, even if stats may not be. Any location info in the books will be generally usable. Adventures should be mostly usable with a little modification. And what gear and spells and what not there are, even with 4th edition stats, should still be useful as ideas to convert to 3rd ed stats.

We want to support the fan community as well as the game itself, and we can do that best by catering to the majority audience. Sorry.
Chrome Tiger
Yeah, pretty much any of the location stuff is cross-platform compatible.

I am intending to submit my Michigan stuff because I just cannot get off my arse to get my own site up and running. Pages upon pages of city info, corporations, Amerind, awakened critters, crime, government, etc. All of that knows no version! A good chunk of it was started in SR2, actually.
HappyDaze
QUOTE
We want to support the fan community as well as the game itself, and we can do that best by catering to the majority audience. Sorry.

So even complete articles submitted with alternate rule-sets for SR won't be accepted? It's not like it would take up all that much effort on your part other than reformatting the material sent in to whatever you're using on your - I assume - PDFs.
Bull
QUOTE (HappyDaze @ Aug 24 2009, 06:45 PM) *
So even complete articles submitted with alternate rule-sets for SR won't be accepted? It's not like it would take up all that much effort on your part other than reformatting the material sent in to whatever you're using on your - I assume - PDFs.


It depends on the article and exactly what you're doing for it, I suppose. I wouldn't rule it out completely. I guess I'm not entirely sure what you're asking here. Are you asking about something along the lines of submitting guidelines for playing SR using GURPS or using d10's instead of D6's? Cause those might be interesting, and even if someone isn't interested in running GURPS, they may be interested in seeing how it could be done.

Primarily though, I'm thinking about people submitting gear and stuff with SR3 stats on them or something. It comes down to the fact that 4th edition is the currently published edition, and has been for 4 years now. I don't want to worry about or deal with "Edition Wars", especially when the wars pretty much over. If someone has something really nifty they want to submit and they're not familiar with 4th, we can work with them to update the information and stats as needed.

Bull
Method
Maybe the SR3 hold outs should have a single page or a side bar. Even if its just a "how to convert this issue to SR3" it would keep a whole segment of the SR community engaged (and remember DS is not the entire SR community; there are a lot of people out there with older SR books). This feature could be contingent on one of said holdouts volunteering their time to do all the number crunching- no interest in doing the work = no page for you.
Chrome Tiger
I agree, because then it opens everything up to all versions when really we need to advance the game, not bolster the older versions and keep it from moving forward. My opinion, everyone's mileage may very.
Chrome Tiger
QUOTE (Method @ Aug 24 2009, 07:17 PM) *
Maybe the SR3 hold outs should have a single page or a side bar. Even if its just a "how to convert this issue to SR3" it would keep a whole segment of the SR community engaged (and remember DS is not the entire SR community; there are a lot of people out there with older SR books). This feature could be contingent on one of said holdouts volunteering their time to do all the number crunching- no interest in doing the work = no page for you.



Hmmm, good call. Okay, this now has me pondering...

Perhaps have "Dumpshock Reload" section with info specifically for SR3? Maybe throw compatibility tags or icons on each article to indicate version compatibility. Provide multi-version stats for vehicles, weapons, spells, etc? I do believe that there should be an SR3 holdout or two that provides the conversion info, otherwise that is adding more time into production.
Chrysalis
Remembering from when I did Edgerunner, a more proper response would be:

"Each article will be evaluated on a case-by-case basis. The editorial team may request changes to the content, style and stylistics of the article from the writer before accepting it for publication."

Veritomancer
One thing I'd particularly like to see is a more detailed description of how various religious organizations and individuals in the 6th world relate to magic. For example, does the typical Wiccan magician believe that it's wrong to use a combat spell on a foe? (given that it would violate the Rede). Perhaps excerpts from theological treatises by noted Catholic and Protestant theologians that reason out why the Awakening came, how come Magic is natural or unnatural, and why if it is natural why this stance is not at variance with the Bible's condemnation of magic-users.

I would also find it interesting to explore the social changes that magic has created in various religions. Do mundane members of faiths that allow or promote magic (such as Asatru, Wicca, Vodoun etc.) suffer from any discrimination because they aren't "touched by the gods"? How has exclusivist religion changed to accommodate the fact that a powerful enough magician can summon something that is functionally equivalent to a Loa, a Fae creature, or even a Demi-God? And if the answer is "they think these creatures are demons, or are simply condensed magical energy focused by the magician's will" then where does that put the angels that a magician of said exclusivist religion might summon?
nezumi
I'm not sure how much of a minority SR2/3 players are precisely (and remember that, for the purpose of statting stuff, 2 and 3 are basically identical). I'm guessing we're in the area of 20-40% of the market, however. If 20-40% of the crunch was usable for SR3, either through dual-stating (which I did for our Drop Bear adventure, and it didn't take very much additional space) or just making it 'edition neutral' and stuff is stated however the author happens to stat it, that would make the magazine worth my time. I'm not huge on a lot of the soft stuff, and things like missions, if I have to re-stat them, it almost takes less time to make my own mission from scratch.


Will an editor be playtesting and balancing the crunchy stuff?
Kerrang
I think that anything touching on rules (missions, gear, NPCs, etc.) should be presented solely for SR4. If you want to take the information and adapt it to an earlier version, you can always do so. This is really no different than players on SR4/4a taking older material and updating it for SR4 (I do this quite often). IMHO, we should be supporting the current edition of the game.
Method
When you're actually publishing a product in dead-tree format that needs to turn a profit you have to consider how to best focus your resources, and supporting one edition makes a lot of sense for a business (Catalyst, for example).

The success of a fan 'zine is based on fan support. It seems to me that if turning a profit isn't your goal you should consider how to give your 'zine the widest possible appeal. A side bar in each issue for converting key stats to SR3 doesn't seem all that intrusive, and if nezumi's estimate is correct, 20-40% more SR players can grab that issue and run with it.

And as a side note- I am not a SR3 holdout. I play SR4 and will never go back. I just think this would be a simple thing to do to engage a (arguably) large segment of the SR community.
Chrome Tiger
QUOTE (Method @ Aug 25 2009, 12:43 PM) *
The success of a fan 'zine is based on fan support. It seems to me that if turning a profit isn't your goal you should consider how to give your 'zine the widest possible appeal. A side bar in each issue for converting key stats to SR3 doesn't seem all that intrusive, and if nezumi's estimate is correct, 20-40% more SR players can grab that issue and run with it.


Provided that there are people that can convert the data effectively and efficiently, it would work. If for some reason that did not happen, it would only serve to cause delays while everyone else scrambles to do the conversions. Sure, there may not be a lot more work per item, but if there are multiple items that time adds up. I had mentioned to Bull to have the people volunteering to maybe convert everything and offer it as an addendum of sorts.
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