...as the game I've known since it's original release nearly a quarter century ago has apparently entered it's fifth incarnation it leads me to wonder if there is anyone out there like myself who still use 3rd ed. No "Ed Wars" here (I read the sticky), lets just say I have my reasons for sticking with 3rd, a good part of which revolves around the heavy investment I have in the various expansions and sourcebooks (as well as a huge pile of 6-siders sitting around collecting dust) and now meager income which precludes purchasing a whole new Shadowrun library .

That said just trying to see if there is anyone else out there from the pre-Crash2 era? Or have they all gone to the "Old Runners' Home" where they sit and reminisce about the days of The Corp Wars, SURGE, The Renraku Shutdown, and Shakeup in the TT while listening to recordings of some young Balkan refugee girl turned classical Novastar?

I play 3rd and 4th both. Not technically pre-crash though, but on a not entirely canonic timeline. I prefer 3rd too, but made my peace with 4th. Will stay off 5th, as it looks, because the rules have a couple more dealbreakers than I can tolerate. Pity really, there are some very good ideas in there, and then they ruin it because of a mix of ignorance, personal hate boners and dyscalculia.

And wasn't she an Aztlaner refugee?

Still running 3rd Ed here. Went through Legacy, Brainscan, had fun with YOTC, ran around in Cal-free lesson with Saito, and now going through Survival of the fittest. All very good times but, in a few months we will be jumping into 5th Ed.

Sorry, no. SR4A but we will start a short and timely limited SR3 session until the SR5-books will be published in german.

I wrapped up a long running SR3 game late last year with Harlequin's Back, could have kept going but with only 2 players left, and one of them leaving the state it seemed time to wrap it up. Once my brain edits out the fumbles and missteps, I'm probably going to remember it as the greatest game ever. Lot's of fun over the course of that game.

There are just things I like about SR3, some of them aren't even good things mechanically, just crazy psuedo-philosophical things. Attributes not adding to skill tests, because no ammount of 'natural ability' is making up for study, practice and training? Yeah, that's how it should be! Rigger3. I spent so much time with that book and hate it as much as I love it. LMSD damage, oh how I miss you and the time a strung out junkie in a cheap motel took down the street sam who thought she didn't need her armour to deal with him because he rolled well enough to inflict a deadly wound, that's right, not X HP worth, just DEADLY. I could play this edition forever. Mind you I'm probably in that position of having played enough and having enough houserules etc that my SR3 is different to everybody else's SR3, which has it's own appeal.

It's a pity I'll probably never get to play or even run it again, I think I've got a good handle on things now, lots of books, and more importantly I still have a character I never got to play. Never played 4th, but picked up 5th hoping I might be able to use the new shiny to get my new group to play Shadowrun, and there are some things I like in there. We'll see how that goes.

I used to play 3rd.
Now can only find people playing 4th and now 5th.
Currently playing 4th and 5th editions.

I used to play SR3 until SR4 was released, when our group moved. The standardization of target numbers in SR4 was MUCH better.

I currently play in a tabletop SR5 game, and I run an online PBP SR4 game. I would never go back to SR3.

I still GM 3rd with houserules that've been brought in from 2e.

4th pissed me off enough that I decided I was done buying SR books until 5e came out, and the 5e core book is damn near unplayable until the errata come out.

Which leads me back to my question in a related topic: does anybody know when the updated book will be released? The german version will not be published until the errata is done, because our books always include these updates. The release date should have been "middle of october", which is...as you see by yourself, is over.

The german version, from what I've heard in the Errata thread, is basically just getting the Missions hotfixes.

The second printing of the English SR5 is identical to the first, and the PDF. In theory, they -may- put errata in 3rd printing, but nobody official's talking about it.

~kinda raises hand~ I don't play that often these days, but whenever I do it's always a 3rd Edition game. Although I have a good deal of the 4(A)th Ed material I have never made the actual transition because neither I as GM (most of the time) nor my players could come to like the changes 4th Ed brought about in terms of fluff and world feeling despite the fact that overall the dice mechanics are in fact better in 4th.

And thanks to the behavior of certain people - one person in particular - that are involved with the current production of 5th Ed I have decided not to buy any of the new products of this particular line ... and so far I had no reason to doubt that decision - particularly after having had the opportunity to skim through the core rules and reading various threads on various different boards like this.

Loved 3e. Never switched to 4e because of the complete change in the mechanics.

Have moved to 5e because the old 3e Matrix is too unmanageable, and one of my new players really wanted to play a decker.

I have found that in general I like it - there are a few nuances that I don't like (grenades being one of them) - but those I just house rule

3 rd ED and still playing it. Lots of house rules and new stuff from play and 4th ED for colour,

3rd edition for me. Love it warts and all. It does what I want for Shadowrun better than the latest incarnations. Really tried hard to make SR4 work for me but after continuously having problems with it realized that the problem was the system not me.

If I'm not playing Sixth World (SR with the Dungeon World system) then I'm playing it with 3rd ed.

Well, you know this old fogey loves 3rd. Tried 4e but opted out of that entirely. We're making 5e characters now, and are a bit more impressed, but it's difficult for us to accept a non-modification of TNs mechanic.

All in all though, I'm thinking 5e is an improvement, and even though we still play 3e, I think our GM is working towards retiring the game (400ish karma each, personally at 510) and moving on to 5e as we play pupils from our current characters.

Hate to break it to you, but the German book has been out since the Spiel Essen

And keep in mind that what binarywraith heard in the errata thread (from me ) was based on maybe a dozen samples...they could have rewritten the entire magic chapter and I wouldn't have noticed


Anyway, back to topic: I still have a semi-regular 3rd Ed round. It's clunky, overdetailed and our GM insisted on priority gen, but like all clunky, overcomplicated oldies it has its charms.

Prefer 3e here myself(with a mix of all the old sourcebooks, since most of the gear books were well compatible.) Might actually be getting a 3e game going again soon!

I've nothing against the new ones(I think 5 is an improvement over 4), but 2e-3e will always remain the closest to my heart in terms of games I love.

(FWIW, we usually run around the 2050-2060 mark.)

I ran SR3 for a while. It was okay. The players were a good bunch and made it fun, despite the fact that most of them had never played. Otherwise, I was kind of meh about SR3. I didn't care much for the art, hated the explosive rules proliferation, and ultimately, it didn't fix the problems that caused me to burn out on SR2 (which were due in large part to rules proliferation... hmm.). I'd play SR3 again, but it wouldn't be my first choice, and I wouldn't want to run it.

If I got to choose, I'd either go back to SR2 (for nostalgia) or just play SR4/SR4A (which I actually enjoy). I'm grudgingly playing SR5, but only because it seems to be the only way I'm going to get to play a game in the foreseeable future.

-paws

3rd Edition forever! I've taken a few year hiatus for a new job and Eclipse Phase, but I still have the game 'open'. I run on RPoL, so finding players is easy. There are a ton of 3rd edition players looking for games.

I play 3rd ed. Not because I don't like 4th or 5th (didn't even read them yet) but because I bought nigh every shadowrun book existing and hence play the 2nd-ed 3rd ed storyplots with 3rd ed, and will move 4th when reaching that point, and move 5th when reaching 5th ed plots.

We just moved to 5th, i'm still stuck in 3rd in my head, mainly because I've played it for damn long i can't get out a 3rd ed dice brain.

missed 4th entirely, never once played a game or even started a character.

I like 3rd the best, and I'm in an on-again off-again game. Between the storyline, the mechanics, and the general feel, 2nd and 3rd appeal to me the most.

The SR3 matrix is why I'm never able to leave. SR4 has rules so bad my group laughs. We're looking at 5 now.

3rd is my prefrence. The emergence of 4th lost me and pushed me away from Shadowrun for a few years. 5th looks like it might be OK, but I'd most rather just go back and play 3rd.

It is still third for me. There wasn't anything I liked about the setting reboot to 4th and the rules system was way to abstract and quirky for my group. 5th is a lot better, but needs to get issues ironed out and I want to see where they're going with it before I commit much more money to it (I bought the .pdf and pre-ordered the intro box set). I never bought anything 4th edition.

For now when I get to play, 3rd edition is still what we play and what we own.

I'm in the old runners home, when I'm not spending time in the old dungeonners home, that is. I kept my game going several years post-4th, but players move and life intrudes.

Oh, yeah. Still playing 3rd. Actually, a version I call 2.5. heh. Just to bring it up, I am starting another 3rd ed. game this Monday at my local FLGS. Looked into 5th and it looks much better then 4th. Though the pages fell out (still waiting on a replacement). Though most of the changes are roll backs to 3rd edition anyway. Funny that.

My group finished what is most likely our last 3rd edition campaign. It has been a sweet run from 2003 til 2013. It is time to start over. I plan on running a reboot of my first ever sr3 campaign with sr5 when we start playing it.

I still play 3rd ed and have no plans on switching. Seen a bit of 5th and kind of like some of it, but 2nd/3rd ed just feels like home for me. I'm actually running a 3rd ed game now that's been going for about 6 months now.

"Thread Ressurectionus!"

Long time 3rd edition player, and still do (Roll20 game starting soon, Sunday afternoons + 10 UTC, yeah, we're Australians)

Looked long and hard at 4th, good guff and plot, couldn't hack the armfull of dice gameplay.
Also looked at 5th, and yeah, all the things we didn't want, were there. (very "me too!")

-Tir

Interesting, since I tend to throw about the same number of dice in both systems (SR3 or SR4), and in fact threw more dice for some characters in SR3 (the 18 Dice (before combat pool) Melee Combat Monster Counterstriking Troll stands out in my memory).

Yea..I am very much pro-3E (or even 2nd) and not a fan of 4E or 5E, but I'm not sure the amount of dice you are chucking being higher is a fair thing to say about 4/5.

< = if that one gets to play at all, that one still plays 3rd.
4th was considered by group and no one said they wanted to try it.
5th has been looked at, scoffed at and promptly ignored.

I've run a few SR5 games at cons and have enjoyed it. I didn't enjoy SR4 at all when I played it. Funny, someone was running an SR2 game and I hearted it more than I ever had before.

I'm going to come back and try 5E again once some additional books are out and hopefully some comprehensive errata. I find myself getting so irritated at things I'm not giving it a fair shake.

Yeah - WE play it now with our Primary GM, and I am often irritated.
Our Other GM runs SR4A, which is my preferred Edition.

I still have my 3rd edition books, although it's been a long time since I have had a chance to use them. I reluctantly picked up a used copy of SR5 because I spend a lot of time here, and I can see things slowly shifting over to SR5. I don't want to become like all of the posters who slowly stopped posting here because they played 3rd edition. I am surprised by the SR3 players who skipped SR4 but are jumping on SR5, since SR5 is a lot more similar to SR4, mechanically, only with a lot of...problems.

I had issues with SR4 mechanics and setting.

SR5 I've not delved deep enough in either to find any of those issues. That could be thanks to good GMs though.

I like 2e best, but I'd run 3e if I had time/players.

I still play 3E too.

I like what has been done in 5th for the most part, but a some of it is just rolling 4th back to what the game used to be. Hopefully I will be able to actually play a game of 5th soon, I have been running Dresden Files for the past few months. But still mainly using 3rd for now.

Quite new player but also sjust playing with SR3.

Bought some SR4 and SR5 materials though....

Greetings Acenoid!

I recommend re-reading the 1050 or so pages of history here and you will become an absolute demon when it comes to making players (and GM's) cry if you're running a 3rd Ed game:).

God, there's some gold here:)


-Tir

I'm pretty much a 3rd ed guy. 3rd ed SR is my favorite RPG system for anything. I don't play table top RPGs anymore but if I did, I'd first see if I could do a more realistic version of SR 3rd ed.

3rd ed was getting so good for firefights. To me it's a tragedy the scrapped it in favor of I don't know what.

EDIT: I don't understand why you're able to completely change the system and then still call it the same system. It feels like false advertising to me.

I feel like 3rd ed was on the pinnacle of greatness but instead of pushing a little harder to get there they blew it up with TNT and gave you something different.

EDIT 2: If I ever get back into table top gaming, since Shadowrun basically went away from where I wanted to be, I should honestly just study up and run Phoenix Command. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_Command) And have extremely detailed realistic firefights forevermore. I actually own some physical rulebooks.

I mean, I don't know, but at a certain point, as we seem to be moving away from firefight realism in our entertainment culture, I begin to wonder if Phoenix Command represents the finest or the most extreme in realism that ever existed.

Thanks, prolly won't work because I'm new to the system the other players in the group are "the grey wolves" of shadowrun. Veterans and highly analytical players Yet, they almost aborted the first mission I GM'ed because the security seemed to be too high. But I think they are used to a GM universe where the GM applies every trick. Currently the veteran players think of 3 possible obstacles that I don't even knew from the rules

We have a house rule - if the players think of it first, the GM can't use it....This time.

Write down the really Evil stuff your players cringe from, toss it on them when they're coming back from a run, winding down from the mission and then T-bone them on the interstate:) It shows you pay attention.
And the magic-users are drained and the street monsters are low on ammo and the stealthy ones are stuck in a car.

Also, biomonitor the guards. No rent-a-donut is going to go charging into a firefight, they're gonna call for the head-office backup, unless your players are face-eating ghouls.

-Tir:)