[Cross-posted from Shadowrun4.com]

Hey folks! I’m Jason Hardy, the new Shadowrun developer. I’m excited to be in this position, and the first thing I want to say is thank you—thanks to all the fans, writers, artists, and everyone else who kept Shadowrun alive for twenty years, long enough for me to first work in the setting as a writer and editor, and now to develop products for it. The fans deserve a special thanks—your dedication and patience has been extraordinary. I look forward to seeing your energy, passion, and—inevitably—criticism as Shadowrun moves into its third decade.

I also want to thank the Shadowrun developers I’ve worked with—Mike Mulvihill, Rob Boyle, Peter Taylor, John Dunn, Jennifer Harding, and Adam Jury. Just the fact that they’ve let me play in this sandbox is enough for me to thank them, but they’ve all been generous with their knowledge and enthusiasm about the setting. Adam actually was the first to break the news to me that I’d been hired when he pulled me aside and told me that that if I f----- up the game he’d been playing for decades, he’d kill me. You don’t get kind of support and dedication just anywhere.

I know why fans care about Shadowrun, because it grabbed me just like it grabbed them. It started, like it often does, with the art, the images that defined “cool� a thousand different ways. And then the text, with the attitude, the edge, and the corner-of-the-mouth cynicism. I saw this stuff, and I fell in love.

So back in the early part of the decade, I wrote a couple of books for the late lamented Crimson Skies game, and the editor liked them. She asked me if there were any other FASA games I’d be interested in writing for, and my answer came quick—Shadowrun. She said okay, and I got to work plotting a novel.

Then FASA shut down, and that seemed like that. There are a lot of tangled stops and starts between now and then, but the end results were that Shadowrun continued, and I’ve had a ball contributing to it in different ways, including a novel (Drops of Corruption), contributions to many sourcebooks, and an April Fool’s Day joke that got nominated for an ENnie. Now I get the chance to push the Shadowrun world forward, and I couldn’t be more thrilled.

I’ve said this many times in the past few weeks—I’m moving into a game with some tremendous strengths. The rules are award-winning and popular, the art is becoming more eye-popping every month, and the talent pool for writing and art is deep. And the setting—ah, the setting that has kept people playing even when the rules were cumbersome, even when product releases were sporadic at best. My shorthand description for the setting is “magic cyberpunk noir,� and usually by the time I get to the third word of that phrase, I’m smiling broadly. It’s everything I love in the world in one place—except it’s missing “Twinkies.� Add that to it (“magic cyberpunk noir Twinkies�?) and it would be perfect.

So my job isn’t to reinvent the rules or the setting. My job is to help as many people dive into the greatest RPG setting there is—and to make sure all the fantastic ideas people have for this setting get out the door and into your hands. One Shadowrun freelancer, Mark Dynna, summed it up well when he said (and I’m paraphrasing here) that our job is to add value to the players’ games. That’s what I want to do—provide storylines, characters, gear, magic, and anything else that makes your game more varied, more interesting, more fun.

And this is where you come in—what would add value to your games? We’ve got plenty of ideas in the works, but I’m happy to add more. Throw in a comment and tell me what you’re looking for!

Thanks for playing!

Crunch. The more, the better.

One thing that struck me recently about this 20 year old game is that there's still design space that can be tapped that would make even a first edition veteran like myself go, "Wow! I hadn't even considered the possibility that they might introduce something like that in the game, but I LIKE IT!" Specifically, I'm talking about Running Wild adding emergent critters to the game, but that's just one recent example. An AI taking over the Arcology. Elevated mana levels from a periodic celestial event making it possible to mine for orichalum. Electing a dragon as president. Keep on throwing us the occasional curveball, it keeps the game alive and vibrant.

Well, first of all, the usual stuff :

-the abandoned weird science sourcebook Frank Trollman once mentioned
-a new London sourcebook
-Shadowrun IN SPACE!!!
-an updated version of Shadowbeat

What i'd be personally interested in :
-a collection of locations for the metaplanes/the resonance realms



And that as well.

My own cross-post from shadowrun4.com/holostreets.com(since they both, right now, link to same place)

First, Jason Hardy, allow me to say: Congratulations! I also hold Drops of Corruption as one of the better of the Wizkids novels(Aftershocks is the other good one!)

Now, what would bring value to my games? Honestly…As a person who went to GenCon with “High tech and Low Life� among the list of “I am looking for these!� books, I can say: art. Personally, I would love more art of both genders of Orks, Trolls, and Dwarves(humans and elves get all the women, it seems, most of the time). Art is how you sell the game, but also a piece of art can inspire a character concept.

Second is: fiction. More fiction. It is hard for me to articulate the setting at times, as, for me, what fits is instinctive. I got this feel for the setting from the novels. With the new novel line in development hell, fiction in sourcebooks like the Anniversary Edition of the corebook, and the Seattle 2072 book, are the best ways for me to get my less experienced players to get some of the same touch for the setting.

And, OK, I admit: for the Seattle 2072 and a Hong Kong book to be made “Core Books,� since, honestly, they ARE important for new GMs, and, I liked that we had someplace other then Seattle to be the core of our games..But with Runner Havens being out of print, as well as all other location books but Feral Cities and Seattle 2072, it is kind of limiting for people just getting into the edition.

Finally, of course, I have to say that I am among the people who really want to see something giving us information, that does not rely on having the previous books on them, on what has happened with the Tirs. Honestly, not everyone has those books(they are very hard to find in dead tree, even now), and, honestly,
I felt that Runner Havens expected one to own New Seattle or, at least, the original Seattle Sourcebook, and that Feral Cities expected one to own Bug City.

Although, Jason..since you are the new line developer for this year...can you maybe get Adam to finally put the SR4A character sheet up on the site? It is a much better sheet then the just plain SR4 sheet that is still up there..I hate having to tell my players that if they want to use the better sheets, they need to buy the SR4A pdf, even if they
bought the SR4A dead tree...

An expanded book on the LA setting, more info on shadowcities and countries outside North America for 4th.

Are you the nice man at the CGL booth I met at D*C this past weekend?

~The Dragon Girl

Been up for awhile, although I haven't gotten around to posting about it because, well, more important news was coming, and I wasn't sure exactly when.

http://shadowrun4.com/resources/previews/C...ractersheet.pdf

Corporate Enclaves is not OOP.

I seriously don't know how you can't look at Seattle 2072 and see "core book," even though it doesn't say so on the title. Full color, hardcover ... what else do you need?

So Tiger Eyes quit?

No. Jennifer is still writing for Shadowrun, and still working development on the Artifact series of adventures. But we needed someone full-time in the role, which was why Jennifer/myself/John Dunn handled things for a few months while Catalyst talked to and then formally interviewed various people for the job.

Some street level stuff. I'd like to see a Sons of Anarchy meets Shadowrun type book. Give me something edgy and not safe. Give me a book that doesn't feel like a reprint of past edition books. And stop trying to be so politically correct. I mean, seriously, must I read the personal pronoun she in a book about criminals. Rebel a little. It feels weird to read Shadowrun books that talk about wetwork but read like some editor cut out all the feeling from the text. I mean Seattle 2072 is a great book, but it reads like a Fromers guide to the city. What would that book read like if it was from a Shadowrunner's point of view?

Core-wise, I think, I'm in pretty good shape. Lotsa of great crunch. But setting-wise, there are a lot of onion peels to pull back. I still feel like I have a 20 thousand feet view of things.

Jennifer is still working with CGL. She was only a temporary co-developer (along with Johnn Dunn, Adam, and Randall Bills), filling in until they got someone. I think she was sane enough that she didn't actually wznt to be the full time dev.

Really, low pay, tons of hours, whiny freelancers, and a largely ungrateful fanbase? I don't know how anyone could turn down benefits like that

(Good luck Jason! )

Bull

Congrats on one of the best, and worst, types of job in publishing (RPG line developer)

For me, looking long the list of Shadowrun sourcebooks I've got going back to 1st ed:

SOTA 207X/Updated Sprawl Survival: Going wireless has changed a lot of things and it would be nice to see a more in depth tech viewpoint on life in 207X as well as how wireless has changed running the shadows.

Hong Kong: I'd love to see the Seattle 2072 treatment for Hong Kong, maybe a couple of other cities as well.

More dual-city books - how's the Tir fairing, Denver, London, Berlin?

Gangs/Mobs/Crime - a new organised crime/criminals book starting at the bottom with street gangs and working up to the various OC outfits.

PDFs Catalyst is great at making their books available as PDFs but there's definitely a market out there for smaller, even niche, products to be released as pdf only. 32 pages or less, more product, without the shipping and printing costs (or needing to get them into your printers windows of availability).

A good idea of what's coming up, planned, in development, art assigned, in editing, in layout, gone to the printers etc. White Wolf does a good job of this, for that matter so does Arc Dream and a number of other companies.

OK...so, Adam, not to sound nit-picky, but...um....what page does it link off of? I mean, I go to the resources page(implied by the path), and I do not see a "previews" page..I click the thing that says "character record sheet" and only see...the old one... Not to sound nit-picky, but...well, it would make sense if one could click on something that will always be there to get to the sheet...



Ah..OK..I heard a comment at GenCon about "not reprinting Corporate Enclaves," and thought it was OOP..

And, why would I think Seattle 2072 was not a core book? Well...this is the 20th anniversary year..It could just be a promotional thing. And, of the corebooks, only SR4A is full colour... Just saying: it seemed more like an Anniversary Product then a Core Book type product..(since, after all, Seattle Sourcebook and New Seattle were not considered corebooks, either..and went out of print)

Thanks for the info - somehow I missed the part that Jennifer is doing the job only temporarily.

Hong Kong has been featured as one of the two main sprawls in Runner Havens




Look forward to Vice then.

I was honestly a little skeptical when I first saw that Shadowrun was getting a new line developer but Bull caught me up on a few things and I did some of my own research and now feel confident that the game is in good hands.

As for what I’d like to see in the game, I’d honestly like to see a book that is sort of a consolidation book, maybe something like Neo-A 2072 or something basically covering information similar to what was presented in Lone Star, Corporate Security Handbook, Neo Anarchist Guides, and Sprawl Sites. Obviously not the information that has already been covered in Runner’s Companion but basically more security options and tools for preventing people from getting in as well as ways around said security. Basically a book that is focused on the details of a runners daily life. Of course, it would need a nice crunchy selection of new equipment, drones, vehicles, and cyber just to keep things interesting.

First: Congratulations Jason

Second: More books like SOTA, it's a great way to add new things a bit at the time. That way you can add some new spells, metamagic, weapons, vehicle, critters etc. without having to devote a whole book to one subject. More location books, but not dealing with a single location, more like Target: Awakened Lands, Target: Wastelands, Shadows of Europe, Shadows of Asia and Shadows of L....

Third: More time to proofread. After the deadline for proofreading Running Wild I've found so many errors it's embarrassing to have been a proofreader.

Lars

Like someone said, more curveballs. Give us some State of the Art: 2072 books. Update Shadowbeat. Keep the art as fresh as it was in SR4A.

And I'll get killed for it, but let's hear what's going on with the dragons too. They've been too quiet lately.

(Crossposted from SR4.com)


Congrats man!

On a purely rules side, I’d love to see some of the more advanced vehicular stuff. I know that 4th edition leans towards smaller, less world-shattering play, and I also realize that 2nd and 3rd edition rigging rules were incredibly complex. But damnit, Cyberpirates is one of my favorite books, both in fluff and in mechanics!

(Also did you know that between SR4A and Arsenal, there are only 2-3 T-birds? I checked, mostly because I wanted my players to have one but 300k was excessive for a starting running team!)

I can’t say I’ve been following the lore of 4th edition as closely as I have the earlier runs. I’m not sure why, to be honest. I guess what I’m missing right now is an “arch-villain.� Maybe he or she is out there, but my time learning Shadowrun was in the shadow of Deus and Ghostwalker (although he isn’t a villain, per se). These were the big movers and shakers, with Pax in the background and Villers being.. well.. Villers. From what I’ve seen in 4th, the stories are all more personal, all smaller. The intro to the 20th anniversary edition, for instance, focuses on the tragedy of one man. It’s -perfect-, but you could drop it into any other era of Shadowrun outside of the technomancer. I love that kind of thing, but again, I’m looking for bigger villains. Some AI has to step up to be the next Deus. Pax has to return somewhere. A dragon needs to get pissy. I’m still a bit saddened that we won’t see the end of the Yucatan war in print. All of that.. all of it is what makes Shadowrun special for me, when it comes to the scaling of the world. I miss that.

(Just try to stay away from Earthdawn if you can, eh? )

And so was Seattle...





This is one of those issues I mentioned. For example - is Vice being worked on, if so when's it coming out, what stage is it at etc. Now I entirely understand a 'when it's done' mentality, but rpgs aren't MMOs/Computer games and it's not that hard to have a working schedule with deadlines for development, writing, art, edit, layout, proof, print, ship, delivery etc. Moreover, if you look at the Shadowrun website there's no hint of Vice there to be seen. You have to search through Dumpshock postings to get any clue of what might be coming up in the future. The website, as far as future books is concerned, is woefully out of date.

Congratulations!

New version of "Shadowbeat" would be nice.
London, Berlin (err...Poland?... We have some ideas about our little noisy country, which could be useful...) - perhaps a new sourcebook for Europe? Maybe some part of "Dawn of Artifacts" or next campaign will take place in Old World?

Thanks to everyone for the fine replies to this point! There's lots of great ideas in there, and plenty for me to think about. A few responses to things that were brought up:

* While CGL policy is to not give specific dates until a firm street date is known, I plan on providing updates on where products are and how they are progressing. Those will come here, through the Shadowrun4.com blog, and through Twitter using the Catalystgamelabs handle. I can tell you that Vice should hit the proofreading stage before long, so progress is being made.

* I unfortunately was not at DragonCon, so the nice person The Dragon Girl met was someone else.

* Adam and Jennifer will remain involved with CGL and SR in particular, for which I am very, very grateful.

Keep those thoughts and ideas coming--based on what I'm seeing so far, I think a lot of you will be pleased by some of the work in the pipeline!

Jason H.

Jason,

Congratilations.

Since you asked for opinions...I'll give some.

First: I'm a geek with a niche, but...more politics! Geopolitics in particular!

When SR has touched the subject recently, there haven't been any wallbangers (I've had ample disagreements with, say, Peter over things, but there was nothing that made me go "Who the hell wrote this?")....In fact, since SR3, it's increasingly become something that FanPro/CGL is very, very good at. I may disagree on where you go, but I can see clearly how you might get there.

Second: Readability. I love the writing of Shadowrun...when I'm not squinting to see it. I realize the tradeoffs that have to be made between PDF and print, but (perhaps this is my own visual difficulties coming into play) there are plenty of times I've wished for higher contrast. Often, it feels like Adam (or someone) went nuts on the background color, and they seem to wash out the text.

Top on my list would be:

-Tir Na Nog Update (not just a London Sourcebook)
-A CAS book, maybe like Target: Atlanta
-An update to Shadowbeat
-New Denver Sourcebook

Just a few ideas. I think what got me hooked originally on Shadowrun has already been mentioned, fiction. The stories are what put the real flesh on the bones of the old system.

Tryed to save sheets and got an unexpected end to page message. Tried a few times and even reopened it a few. On a whim I clicked it to page two and tried again saved fine. No idea whats up with that.

Congratulations Jason, it seems Shadowrun is in good hands, best of luck and all that.

As far as what I would like to see, most has already been mentioned, more location sourcebooks, a new SOTA, and more novels. SR4 has a solid rules base, but I think the vehicle rules need to be revisited in a big way, so I would like to see a new Riggers Black Book to tackle that.

Finally, I would like to see more varied Missions settings. I like the idea of the Missions arcs, but I have not been thrilled by the settings, and the fact that they roll off several years (real time) in a specific city. I ran alot of the Denver missions, but New York is just not my cup of tea. Throw out an occasional one off mission in a core city like Seattle or Hong Kong. Sometimes I lack inspiration/motivation, and will gladly throw down $3 here or there for a PDF mission that fits into my campaign and lets me shift the GM duties into glide for a week or two.

Thats too bad I was just curious. I met a few people and it was hard to keep track of who all was what.


I second the CAS motion!

Jason, congrats, that's great to hear. It's very pleasing to see that the new Big Man in the Chair is someone that has promised to include more veiled references to drop bears. (Did you think we'd forget? )

More novels, updated to the current timeline would be a beautiful thing. Catching up on a few locales, as mentioned, in a way that doesn't require holding old books, would be nice as well. I'm glad to see that there are some adventure modules in the pipes (Dusk:Artifacts, et al) and I'm very stoked for Vice 'cause that's one I've been waiting for quite a while for.

As something that hasn't been mentioned yet, I could go for some inclusion of a few choice characters, with stats and background. Flesh some folks out like Prime Runners or Target:Matrix did. I've enjoyed the rough cut adventure outlines we've seen before, because I like watching the rise and falls of the movers and shakers of the SR world, and occassionally participating in it through runs. More of that would be great.

Something I have always wanted to see might be a little out on the limb. I mean, Shadowrun is about running the shadows and that's great. I want to see something that shows other criminal elements aside from the typical Mob/Yakuza/Russian Mafia type groups.

What are other people doing in the shadows? The ones that aren't out to stick it to the man/corps.

What about people that aren't either wage slaves working in some office or R&D lab waiting for themselves to be extracted or shot?

Where do Shadowrunners cut their teeth before they become the hardcore professional criminal. I want to see gutterpunk stuff. The down and dirty low tech working towards being high tech. I want Y.T. on her plank working to deliver a package, Hiro just trying to deliver a pizza and not crash into a pool. Types like Molly and Johnny trying to make it in the shadows and just keep alive. I want to see how rare and scary magic can be. These low down types might have a wiz kid mage or adept helping them out but not every team would face off against magic.


Yeah, okay, so I am not really articulate here.

Vehicles: Lower end stuff, smartboards, scooters.
Weapons: Disposable guns, things that are more flash than function.
Cybernetics: Things you usually don't see. Head Guns, cyber quills, dentatas
Runs: Cross country deliveries, lets see the UCAS/CAS, more personal level type runs to establish contacts and why they help runners. Fixers and Mr. Johnson are fine and dandy, but they're basically impersonal mouth pieces for a GM in general. I'm looking for Favor for a Friend type runs.


Rules Stuff: Revamp Technomancers, everyone pretty much feels they're second class hackers and they shouldn't be. Lower the cost of complex forms, or give them less Resonance loss from cyber. This whole magic-without-being-magic thing is just ugh. Otaku were better.

I'm done rambling, hope this can be translated to something useful.

No new Rigger book, we all know what happens when a new Rigger book is published, and nobody wants a new edition...

Lars

Congrats, Jason, and good luck!

I don't have a lot of suggestions, since I've been happy with what's been coming out. I wouldn't mind more location books; maybe something CAS/Caribbean like Miami or New Orleans, or an in-depth (i.e. Hong Kong sized) treatment of a fun Euro city, like London, Paris, Rome or maybe an expanded Istanbul.

I'm not a huge fan of more gear, spells, etc., since (a) we've already got a lot and (b) the more stuff you put in more books the tougher it is to keep track of everything, but I know I'm in the minority there.

I do....

That said, I actually like the concept behind the "cinematic" vehicular rules, as opposed to the hard as steel rules in the past. Ask any of my players about my first vehicular chase with them, where they jackknifed the semi they were driving to throw off some bikers and then threaded it through a tight alley on 11 wheels. The system looks custom-made for vehicular wire-fu, but the options are limited ATM.


Oh, speaking of, can we please get some previews/ideas about what is coming with the Runner's toolkit? This is my most anticipated product now, especially considering that there are almost no "permission to photocopy" pages -- like that handy rigger action/dice pool chart isn't photocopyable, for instance. I'd also love a nice combat breakdown -- I still am not sure if a long burst is -5/-6 or -5/-11 like it was in SR3.

Like I said -- I have been waiting on the Jason announcement before finishing some other site related-things.



New Seattle was reprinted several times during the SR3 lifespan.

Sourcebooks get reprinted based on their sales record, and on how "complete" the game will be without them.

For the love of all that is fun, photocopy anything you like for your own use out of any book you've ever bought.

That's everyone. The only other real class is "the man," aka Damien Knight and Co., and even they aren't truly outside the system. It's (post)cyberpunk. It's dystopian. You're one of these groups of people.



Well, you certainly aren't alone. I hate stuff that's put out just to result in power creep. Give me updated locales.

Is that supposed to be serious? :/ Uhm, huh?


(As a female Shadowrun fan - I like female 'runners. Fair enough, have less of them, I don't expect the Male/Female split of criminals to be 50/50; but as far as I can tell, there tend to be a lot less female criminals/runners mentioned than male; which seems about right tbh)

That's probably seeing as how females are smarter that they don't get caught as often thus don't make the news.

Congrats on the new job



Some things I absolutely love:-


Fiction (Yes! More Fiction! Pleaaaase more Fiction!)

Location books (So lovely - and there are so many little ideas for plots in there, I love that!)



Some things I'd love to see:-


Less of a veil drawn over the past (I came in at 4E. I don't fancy trying to get my hands on every book/pdf ever, but I'd like to a little more about the past. At least enough that when my players ask vague questions my answer can be more than "I dunno *shrugs*", and atm even the 'timelines' in the books are so pared down I often have no idea what happened. Especially in LA, in Corporate Enclaves for example - without more knowledge, the timeline there is really confusing)

Some more general location books - maybe one book covering a little taster of EVERYWHERE (What's going on in Europe? Subsaharan Africa? Mongolia?)

An updated 20A GM screen

Personally, I would think Shadowrun would have plenty of twinkies... that were probably made in the '90s. Hell, after the nuclear apocalypse the only things that survive will be cockroaches, Keith Richards, the Vaults™, and Twinkies.

I agree. After all, there are no female GMs, players, PCs, NPCs, readers, or writers of Shadowrun. We only throw in the pictures of women to attract more male viewers.

I suspect that tweak didn't mean stop having female characters in Shadowrun, but rather the "PC Friendly" use of the personal pronoun "she" rather than "he" in writing, since "He" was the standard for centuries, and the former is becoming more and more widely used.

<shrug>

Doesn't matter to me one way or another.

Sixth World Almanac ...


Runner's Toolkit

BTW, the person you likely talked to at Dragon*Con -- bald, excitable, not the tallest man on the planet? -- was probably our awesome art director, Brent Evans. If you spoke to a taller guy, that would be Loren Coleman, co-owner of the company.

If the person was friendly and knowledgeable, then it was Brent.

Ha ha! Just kidding, Loren! Not that he ever comes here!

Anyway, besides providing a look at a lot of countries, 6th World Almanac also rips the veil off the past--at least one page for each year of Shadowrun's history. Sooooo much historical goodness . . .

Jason H.

Hmm, well, lets see... The three things that come to mind the most when I read through my SR4A book is:
- I have trouble finding games/players, how can I meet up with others better in meatspace/IRL?
- To continue on that thought, any chance on a official cyberspace/online SR4A game to compete with what NWN2 / DDO / D&D4 is doing?
- And last but not least, I wonder what is going on in (and in the past being a relatively new player) the SR4A 2072 world in about the location where I live, so Vancouver Island or at least Vancouver, BC Canada which I understand is Salishe-Sidhe land now...

I apologize if that actually has nothing to do with your position but it is what is on my mind as a lover of SR4A. Take care and happy hunting in all your games.

Got the SR4a book today. My Q&D review is HERE.

20 years and still going strong. Must be doing something right!!



Just kidding

The whole he/she/it thing never even showed up on my radar. It never mattered to me either way.

Yes, but when can we give you our money and get our grubby little hands on on this? I'm especially wanting it for my players.

I may be new, but I know enough not to speculate on dates of book releases! The book is making good progress (just saw an illo for a story I wrote for the book--great perspective of a guy jumping down a waterfall!) and hopefully the worst of the speedbumps are behind us. Hopefully.

To get to CanadianWolverine's point, I very much want to boost the opportunities for players to find a game in their area, hopefully using the demo team website. That could be a great tool for helping people meet up to play. As far as electronic games go, though, that's out of my hands--Catalyst does not have the license to do electronic games. We'll keep hoping for Smith & Tinker to move on that!

Jason H.