Heh

So will it now include Knight Errant of Errata?

Overall I am liking the concept of Anarchy, and yeah there is still some needed tweaks, though we are still wrapping my head around a few other parts of it, but I am older and slower now so takes longer to learn new tricks.

So the text is not about its content, but about the layout of the page it is printed on. That doesn't make a bit of sense. Do you even realize that?

I think im mostly with hermit on this one...

I'll probably run it and house rule it, but i really hope CGL forgets this "your way to rpg is wrong" garbage that has become popular. When it was just a handful of indie games it was interesting because it made you think about if you agreed or not but we have those games we dont need every game to be a lockeroom game as stated earlier. I like the idea though, hope we see this type of product going forward.

So how does this play compared to the regular game? Faster, more streamlined? How much more or less prep does the GM need to do and how much of that can the players help with?

I feel like I am about to get jumped on, but here goes:

This plays faster and more streamlined than SR5. Character generation is 15 to 20 minutes and game play goes by roughly twice as fast. Each Turn --a round of Narration, roughly equivalent to an Initiative Pass--goes by faster because each character gets one action or attack (possibly two with Wired Reflexes, etc.). The action is more equitable because, those without Wired, are not pushed back into the dark corners of combat.

The drama is more equitable too because combat-monsters still have a Narration to do, even in social scenes.

The GM needs drastically less preparation. Contract Briefs are one page, and consist of three scenes. Each scene simply describes where they are, what the runners might try to accomplish and what their likely obstacles are. You are encouraged to speed up, change, eliminate, or add scenes as necessary to further the plot of whatever you and your players get up to. You could easily run a scene knowing only 1-2 key pieces of information that you want to be discovered or encountered.

That being said, this game is not for those GMs that want to push their players through the novel that they have written. Imagine how sideways a normal, highly-prepped SR5 game goes, and then add another dimension: Plot Points. Plot Points are what drives the meta-game within Anarchy. They are spent to twist the plot or take actions outside or above Narrations, and they are earned by good role-play or exciting/humorous/dramatic Narrations. This goes back and forth between players and GMs until a story emerges that will likely be very different than the story prepared.

Players help with every aspect of the game except tossing their own opposing dice for tests. With the GM, they decide power levels, character limits, scene pace, plot advancement, and character development.

That being said, this game may not be for those players who are uncomfortable with the burden of story; they will have to pull their own weight in Narrations but there are guides on how to do this. This game may not be for those players who like "shopping" for the best possible swag; gear and player options are boiled down to their base components. Please note that I am not denigrating this style of play; it's just that there are already games for these players (I am one) and they are called: Shadowrun 1, Shadowrun 2, Shadowrun 3, Shadowrun 4, and Shadowrun 5.

[Also Note] For those that dislike this game already, please add, "in general" to every thing I said and end each sentence with, "...at my table."

[Please don't take this bad, it's not intended to] What I'd like to understand is how there was an equity problem in the first place. I mean: do such situations as combat and social scenes turn into cybersam of face solo minigames at your table? Or is it just that such characters outshine the others in the specific situations where they are supposed to?

Because in all honesty, nerfing combat monsters in combat and forcing them to act in social scenes is clearly no equitable, that's pretty much unfair. I now see how you get it to be more magerun.



As they are universally recognized as bad GMs, I'm not sure what you're looking at then. Unless you're saying classic SR is pushing towards this kind of GMing, which is false.



I'm really curious here. I can see how it can be fun and all, but I'm wondering if there's not a price. A lot of my pleasure as a player is precisely the thrill of the unknown: the idea that there's a plot to uncover that I don't know, the idea that you don't know if this ganger-looking ork is more than just that and will wipe you on the floor if you headbutt him… And as a GM, I really like to instillate this kind of feeling. Anyway, what I mean is can you get that if the players have such a strong influence on the game pace?

@ Gingivitis




http://shadowhelix.pegasus.de/images/thumb...200px-Ghoul.jpg




Nobody hates Railroader more than I do, but to be honest, some of the old Modules/Adventures (Mercurial,DNA/DOA, even Queen Euphoria) are quiet.....railroady .
I'm currently GMing Queen E and I have to change quite some of the Plots to not make the Run a Railroad !
otoh I doubt I could play Queen E with Anarchy....


with a Dance from Above
Medicienman

I understand what you mean, but the problem is with the module in this case.

yes and thats why old SR is sometimes pushing the GM to Railroad
so


Yes , there are some Runs/Adventures that have Railroad Elements in them and they are pushing the GM
( I won't be pushed especially not by an old Module/Adventure, but some GMs are ...more pushable than I am, especially younger or not so experienced GMs )

with an affirmative Dance
Medicineman

I'm pretty sure in this context we're talking about the game system and game universe. If you're willing to include some of the 1990's written adventures which happen to be railroady to it, I don't follow you. I was replying to a post saying: "That being said, this game is not for those GMs that want to push their players through the novel that they have written.". There's no way you'll find such GM advice in SR1-4. And clearly it's not needed.

I didn't say it was fair; I said equitable. Is it fair that a character that spent all his/her resources to be a beast gets 4 Initiative Passes and kills all the things, while the face spent all their resources on contacts and a pretty smile gets only one Initiative Pass? Sure. Is it equitable? No.



Novelist GMs (or those running aforementioned railroady modules) will be especially disappointed by Anarchy. Sure, in SR5, a player can muck a story up by not doing a thing or killing a guy too fast. But in Anarchy, they can really do a number, by introducing completely foreign objects into the mix or invalidating whole scenes with better or worse ones.

"That being said" ™, there are rules to make Anarchy a more traditional GM role, and I am sure that would work too.



Everything has a price... (Squeee! I finally got to say it!)

I'm not a native speaker, but I was pretty sure the terms are quite synonymous, and a quick look at the internet seems to tell me I was pretty right. How is it not equitable that spending your chargen ressources to master combat lets you outshine in combat people who spent those resources on being good at social interactions?

Anyhow, are you acknowledging that SR:Anarchy is explicitely unfair to people who wants to play combat monster, like I said it was?



Sounds like SR5 is even worse than what I thought. Frankly, I don't get how they departed of the idea that GMs should let player derail and adapt (and try to forecast) when the original plot is derailed.

You know, the problem with railroady GM has always been about the GM being a moron, not the game system. A lot of RPGs (and for sure SR1-4) advise against railroading more or less explicitely.

The problem with the railroady GM is not that the story suddenly ends when you're not doing the thing or killing the guy too early. The problem is that the guy will not actually be dead, or that he will miraculously dodge the bullet, or that his son which is exactly like him will take his place and that finally killing him didn't change anything at the story. Anarchy will not prevent that. Either the railroady GM will bring back the players to his story one way or another whatever objects they bring in, either the players get angry and leave the table. Exactly as it happens in every other RPGs.

As has been pointed by hermit, the only way to be surely ridden of railroady GM is that you actually get rid of the GM.



Fair enough… But then I'll take this as acknowledgement

News flash: Outward appearance does have an influence on reputation. Whether you ride a pickup with confederate flag and rifle rack, a kookmobile, a VW Bus, or a car that's average in every way, it leaves a certain impression.


News flash 2: Layout is not just there to provide employment for artists. If you think it doesn't matter, how about Shadowrun fantasy edition, with dirty parchment background #32452 and fancy initials? Or try the new ACM edition, very print friendly in all black text on white background...

News flash: I didn't imply the opposite at any time. Thanks for not bending my words if you don't know what to say.

1) Even synonyms have different connotation and nuances that define them (such as childlike vs childish).

Here I am defining "fair" as "getting what you deserve." You spent all your resources on melting faces, you deserve to melt faces.
Here I am defining "equitable" as "receiving equal treatment." You are not a combat monster but you deserve to participate in this shared story as much as everyone else.

(I'm not going to debate further the meaning of words, btw. The above is what I meant by the words I used.)

2) We all know that Novelist GMs can (and should) run into problems in any setting or system of excessively wrought Plot. That doesn't mean that Novelist GMs don't exist still AND it doesn't change the fact that Anarchy will be particularly punishing to them. Players are meant to guide and reshape the plot.

3) Some are upset here because the players have too much say and will lose their sense of the unknown, and some are upset that there is still even a GM at all. You cannot easily have it both ways but you can compromise and adapt.

There are rules to set a more traditional GM structure; do that if your players don't want a shared storytelling experience but still want the rules light aspect. Also remember that EVERY player gets a share in the story (see equitable) so the discovery of the unknown comes not just from the GM but from the other players too. (Player B: "Plot twist! This ork is really a hard-ass and has friends around the corner!" *spends Plot Point*)

What I have been saying is that there are a lot of ways you can play this and they are built in (or purposely not built in) to the core Anarchy system. You can do what you want with it; it says so on the box.

Giving everyone a time to shine is a storytelling problem and should be solved with storytelling, not even more unfairly restrictive rules. That's true for any system, be it traditional top-down- or collaborative storytelling.


And you can stop insinuating that everyone who doesn't get all starry-eyed about Anarchy like you is one of them. Don't bother denying it, that is what your novelist GM strawman is all about. Can you please just drop this?


But that is totally different from allowing all players to shape the plot - it's not "you wake up and are now standing in Los Angeles, at midnight, at the top of a sunken skyscraper", it's "actually, the NPC is green, not blue, but otherwise yup Shiawase underwater research station", *spends one of three recoloring points per adventure*, to give a drastic and unwholesome example.

Compare this to MGME, where someone at the table sets a scene with a random table that gives out cues like "Introduce A New NPC - Overindulge - Attention", which then are used by everyone interested to suggest how the scene develops from past scenes. To use your ork eample and my example MGME roll, P1 suggests a bunch of Skraacha appear, and their attention is immediately drawn to the runners who intimidate one of theirs; P2 suggests using a pre-existing enemy who is a Skraacha lieutenant as their leader, and P3 is okay with both and doesn't add anything. The next scene is a battle against Skraacha. Plot developed on without everyone already knowing the full story, and without a GM.

Now that is equitable. That is collaborative plot shaping. Interrupts like Anarchy allows aren't really. And neither are players and the GM in Anarchy equitable. The roles are still far too different.


Yes, Anarchy RAW is a compromise. That is why it makes neither those hesistant about the whole narrative gaming thing and those like me who want an actual narrative system instead of GM lite happy. Surprising, I know, but what is your point?


Yeah. Right. Layout is the entire difference between in-character and out of character texts in shadowrun rulebooks. Riiiiiight.

But now that you mention it, would the fantasy or blank text change whether something is in-character fluff or crunch? If so, give eamples as to how it does!

You can define it how you like, they are not receiving equal treatment. You pay a lot to get a combat monster, you get as much action as the face who didn't.

I understand the philosophy you're defending here. I think it's a terrible one. It's just making characters more bland, and it's making worse the fighter character problem I've been pointing at. Forcing him into social situation and having everyone shining in combat is just making the combat character worse off. There's no need for it.



This is actually not true. As long as the GM is different from the players, he's allowed the final say on plot reshaping.

The very fact that Anarchy is advertised as rule lite means that the rules won't protect you from being railroaded.

Honestly, the argument can go both way here.



I'm upset at nothing personally. I'm not asking for rule-lite, GM less games or anything. My point is just that you're advertising anarchy as preventing railroading and I really don't agree, and that the idea of having everyone play a role in combat is sensible, which clearly is not good for the combat character player. My original point is that you can't pretend everyone will have the shadowrun feel playing it since many tables like shadowrun for its intricate rules and fluff.



Ok, let's play on words. I used the phrase "thrill of the unknown". And if you reread my post, you'll understand why you don't assess the raised problem at all by saying the players can come up with some surprise element too.

Say you're reading a thrilling book. Every page you want to read the next one. When you cannot keep your eyes open any more, you hardly get to sleep because you want to know what's next. The plot is getting more intricate, it's unravelling but each time you get more mysteries, and you want to know what's going on but it's only hinted at. And when you finish the book, you realized that there's a next book that's not written yet. What you're proposing me is, "hey, read that fan fiction by someone who read the book just like you". See the problem here? That someone doesn't know the big picture, doesn't know the real mystery to uncover. Well, that's clearly not thrilling.

This is not the discovery of the unknown. This is exquisite corpse. A fun exercise but an exercise still. It's not even a real jump scare…



Said every RPG ever.



Agreed. A lot.

Except that time you considered it "pretty much bullshit", but bygones...


Sooo...if you're open to the possibility of vehicles having a bad rep, and you accept that such a bad rep can affect the standing of the owner, what exactly was your problem with having vehicles people don't want to be caught dead on?

The first point is of course that the idea of the average shadowrunner giving a shit about his reputation once dead is laughable.

But seriously, you know, there was a context on the quote you used, which was that shadowrun is not set in a moronic fast and furious universe. Owning a vehicle can affect your reputation among some categories of populations. Such as saying average sprawlers or jet setters will find you stupid on a dodge scoot. Since of course sprawlers and jet setters are clearly not the majority of your encounters and the people hiring you, most shadowrunners won't give a shit about using a scoot for their everyday tasks, let alone being found dead on one.

As has already been said, you can make a lot of witty sentence saying some people will find your dodge scoot is ridiculous. Like in real life, these people are moron that are bad at evaluating people's value. The people who will really matter won't care what you riding but evaluate you based on your past acts and actual abilities. This includes the Johnson, the fixers, mercenaries, cops, magic group and whoever you usually meet.

Or actually, those people didn't care in SR1-4. Suddenly, in Anarchy it seems that Johnson is Dom Torreto.

Called it.

SOME of you forgot the add the "...at my table" to the end of everything I said.

@ Hermit: It seems like you wanted Anarchy to be a GMless system, and Anarchy did not deliver. I agree. It also never purported to be one, so I feel that is a wash. This is obviously not the game for you and it seems like you already have the game for you. I am glad you have one.

@ freudgo: I reread all of your posts and, frankly, I have literally no idea what you wanted from Anarchy or any other game (apparently not even SR5?). I hope you find a game that you like soon. MAYBE it could be Anarchy if you gave it a shot. Maybe not.

@ people who think I am "Starry-Eyed" with Anarchy, I submit to you my first post in this thread:



If you saw how many posts I made in the errata forums, you would also know I am not starry-eyed, I am hopeful.

"That being said, " ™ I AM excited about Anarchy because I finally get to play in the setting I love with people I love because they finally were willing to give it a shot. That only happened because of Anarchy. And it turned out great...

...at my table.

So if anyone's curious about why I don't come in here very often anymore...it's threads like this.

Gee, not exactly hard when you flamebait like that.

Both sides in this have been nipping at the other so I can not say either side is blameless, but please don't try acting the martyr in this.
You wouldn't get this past FJ on the ShadowGrid without getting at least a warning, why do you feel it's acceptable here?

And for the record, before you chime in with some back hand comment about MY play preferences, I also happen to like Anarchy and have been looking forward to it for some time.
But even as an experienced SR player some parts of it do leave me scratching my head and won't deny that I am still working through some bits to try and smooth it out for better play.
Which is why I am here as well as the other forums, looking at both sides to sift through the bickering to find those gems to help me refine my game and make a better experience for my group.



No, you give people the impression you might be a bit starry-eyed when you open another thread where you very much give one the feeling they are only to post praise (it's in the thread title afterall) and any other opinions/issues/concerns need not apply.
If this thread is soooo horrible, why are you still here?
*looks in at the other thread*
Yeah, not a lot of chatter there, funny that.

In case you haven't noticed, DS doesn't play yes-man well.

It was built by folk who are passionate about the game and they poke and prod at something like a sore tooth, not because they are bitter but because they want to find the best out of it.

Do they kvetch a lot? Sure.

Will they nitpick at the littlest thing? Guilty.

Can they sometimes be too opinionated and a bit of a grognard set in their ways? Absolutely.

But when you need something Samsonite tested to see how things shake out, they are the 800lb gorilla the game devs should have been using to stress test the product prior to release, rather than the weak sauce quality control we have seen to date in several of CGL products.

Is CGL the only culprit in this? Of course not. Many games, both PnP and electronic have fallen into the cycle of churning out incomplete product to keep afloat with the intent to fix it later, whether in errata or in future editions.
It's a cutthroat business, not too unlike that of college professors whose manta is Publish or Perish. Except there is no equivalent of tenure for a gaming company, so there is never any resting on their laurels unfortunately, because you are only as good as the next projected item on the horizon.

And yes, we are grateful there are folk like Patrick Goodman and Co. who are sifting through the mounds of chaff to set things aright once more via the errata, thanks largely in part to community input like your own and others on the errata threads.

Will everyone ever be able to agree on things? Probably not, but we can agree to disagree without the subtle and not so subtle jabbing at each other.

We, and by we I mean all of DS, is better than this, though spirits help me it doesn't seem like it some days.



*sighs*
And there is that to top off my night.

Yes. You can spend a plot point to add to a scene, so you can totally do that as a GM or as even another player.

Not disagreeing with you but its also not for those of us who make it up as we go. I literally write a brief "A new drug hits the street called Jazz Hands and Orks are ending up in the hospital" and go... I also have a list of NPCs that grows over the campaign. Its all on the fly

[edit] Anarchy reminds me alot of VtR especially 2.0 - some really good neat ideas are in there, certainly more like a rule set I want to see but someone wasnt really ready to push it to the limits and so its got some old baggage still hanging on, which for this old gamer I got the older editions and the house rules I already wrote... Hopefully it does well enough to get an Anarchy 2.0 someday. My only real complaint compared with SR1-5 is that arrogant language. Lets be honest every edition of shadowrun has a few warts.

I would honestly like to make it clear that I was not insinuating that anyone here had a bad play style. The style that I was speaking against was the novelist GMs, which were "universally recognized as bad GMs", by freudgo (so no disagreement there) and Hermit prefers GM-free games (so, obviously not a railroader there). What I was doing was answering the question of:


and I still feel like the answer is: If you prep too much it will hurt because your players get to help a lot.

@Sendaz, I agree. I should not have played the martyr there. I probably should have stopped trying to defend my position about 72 posts ago. I started that other thread because I honestly want to talk to someone, anyone, about something positive. Because if someone asks me if it is a good game, I am going to say yes.

Basically a good old SR3 is fine for me, but nice try on shifting the point. You know, the goal is to discuss anarchy. You're praising it for being what it's not, and we just disagree.

Anarchy is not a system that will prevent railroading, it's not a system which will work exactly like your table want, and apparently it quite doesn't give you the thrill of the unknown.



Well actually this discussion expanded a bit. Turns out no, you cannot really get the thrill of the unknown, suspense or surprise. The thrill comes from the fact that something exist and you have to discover what it is. Doesn't work if the player next to you just make up something from the story he knows exactly like you.

Narrative games where players can impact the story (or even that plays without a GM) don't have to be better or worse than classic games with an almighty GM.
It's a different approach, that gives a different flavor and a different experience.

Some people prefer one, other prefer the other, there's no use in trying to argue the superiority of one over the other.

I should not have been snippy in my tone either, there are better ways to address everyone and I do apologize.

And I have been looking at your Anarchy resources and finding some interesting bits there, so thank you for putting that up for us and others to tap.

Because of course, only hardcore tuners have ever made jokes about crappy Ladas and their supposed clientele...in fact, hardcore tuners in their plastic-ardoned Hondas are another stock character.

Nope. But only them will think the guy getting out of the lada doesn't know his shit because he's getting out of the Lada. You seem to mistake reputation with style.

But actually, you're shifting the point by forgetting the book is making a general statements that encompass all possible runners. Book says every shadowrunner will really care about getting a showy vehicle. That's never been true of shadowrun before, that's a crappy concept, and that's ridiculously disempowering for a game where chargen usually promised you a lot more versatility than that.

Been running my games like that for a decade now, too. And not because of some lofty player-centered fun concept (though that, of course, sounds nice). It's self-preservation. See, if you spend a day's work preparing a module-style adventure, statting all NPCs, making up locations and everything, and an intricate plot, you'll have wated an entire day's work five minutes into the average game, because a player had an idea that you didn't see coming. It's okay for players to have that. Railroading them would suck for everybody. So I wing it and bring only a vague concept, a few core NPC, and a few scenarios I will probably use to the game, fill in the rest as it comes, reacting and acting on player cues.

What I hoped Anarchy would be is something akin to MGME. Now, that may have been me misunderstanding the premise. I honestly could care less about simplified rules - that becomes dumbed down to my taste really fast and I never was intimidated by middle school maths. I do care - a lot - about disappearing the position of the GM. For a very simple reason - usually, I am the GM, and I don't really want to. Nobody else does. GMing always is the more tedious and less rewarding part of the game (not unrewarding, but less rewarding). You get no thrill of discovery, you have to keep track of a lot of stull, have to smooth the plot's wrinkles in as underhanded a way that nobody notes, on the spot, and usually, you're a kindergartener, too.

Now, on its own, Anarchy probably works well enough. It's clunkier than FATE, and I still don't get why characters need tags when they have cues, and I dislike how this, again, favors the magical over the mundane, but it's probably playable. It's just not for me. As freudqo wrote, it does remind me of nWoD: A lot of good intentions and ideas, but lacks the boldness and ambition to live up to them. A game like an EU Guideline. Nowhere near as bad as the press it gets, but it could have been far better had it not been watered down by a lack of courage.

Oh yeah, and the tone it is (in parts) written in.


It's the layout, obviously.

Hehe. I've felt like this very often after a few sessions of GMing and finishing a campaign.

And though, each time I get to play a PC, I want to GM again. Some kind of circle I guess.



More seriously, this weird blurring of in and out of character writing style (someone said opinionated I think…) reminds me of what Gingivitis said at the beginning about the problem with this game being for people who already know the SR universe. Someone used to shadowtalk might feel like he's reading some of it and add the mental "hey" Glyph was talking about. But a beginner will perceive it as a universe where you actually shouldn't buy a Dodge Scoot.

Which I find a bit sad (for the community), because you have a lot to offer, Patrick.

Heh. It's more subtle with me. I just tend to take control of scenes if I don't consciously keep myself back (and prod my players to contribute too, because they instantly snap back into consumer player mode too). Will need some work, I guess. But at least it removes the need for GM KArma and GM payment so the GMs characters aren't totally neglected and can't play well with the regulars even if the GM can catch a break.

So at the risk of getting involved, I'll add a few more comments as to what I think are the merits of SRA.

Namely, after playing RPGs for.. longer than I'd care to do the math on right now, I think that a system LIKE SRA is what I have always wanted for the Shadowrun Universe.

Thinking about a game like D&D 4th, which is essentially a collaborative wargame (NOT a true RPG system), there's very clearly defined roles and rulesets to follow. This is neither here nor there, but it does lead to players getting pigeonholed / stuck in ruts in what they do (e.g. "I guess I use my at-will power to attack the hobgoblin").

SR5 is similar, except the rules are way too complicated to parse easily. If you actually followed all of the rules laid out (which has never happened in any Shadowrun game I've ever played, by the way), you'd be bogged down in a morass of a ridiculously complex system. That, combined with the priority system saying THIS character can do A, B, but not C or D, and THAT character can do C and D, but not A or B, means that players have a lot of "phone time" while the specialists talk to the GM during their time to shine.

That's boring and lame, and not at all how actual humans interact. If I could wave a wand (or power focus?) and make running the matrix at the speed of thought the matrix happens at, perhaps I'd feel differently. However, the subsystems of SR5 means that no matter who the spotlight is focused on, there are others at the table it ISN'T.

Enter SRA. It's not perfect; it's not necessarily what I would have done, there are editing errors, etc. etc. etc. So what. I want a narrative based game that all players can contribute to.

Some other people in the thread are complaining this means players who are heavily invested in combat aren't stars compared to their "face" peers. I suppose that's accurate. I don't really care. I don't like that players feel like they need to sit on their hands during one of the phases of the run because their numbers aren't optimized for that section. I WANT the Troll to weigh in on the negotiation, and say they need extra 'yen for more grenades. I think the face should be able to perform a trickshot and save the gunbunny from the guard that he didn't see. I want the hacker to describe something cool with technology and for it to just HAPPEN, because trying to figure out how it happens is needlessly complex and not necessary. Same for the mage - it's Magic for frak's sake; it should be whatever a player wants it to be.

SRA is the system I wish I had been playing these past 20 years; and building stories with my fellow players instead of getting stuck trying to optimize characters, or have arguments about the matrix or drones or magic or a million different things.

So in summation; I like this system. I think it's a great way to open the world of Shadowrun to more players who otherwise wouldn't see it (and be real; the complexity of Shadowrun has always caused it to be limited in size compared to it's competitors). If there are issues with specifics of the system, I encourage others to create homebrewed versions and adjust it to their particular table.

My advice to everyone is to stop attacking strawmen, or argument semantics (literal semantics, as in the meaning of words), and embrace this for what it was intended as; an open narrative based system meant to eliminate the chaff and help create cool stories.

-DrZ

What's the difference? At what point do you honestly feel like someone adding a new wrinkle to the plot, and the GM making it up before the section matters? Either way it gets revealed at the same point in the narrative, assuming it has some degree of logically consistency.

Honestly, I think you're just looking for a reason to not like giving players control of the narrative and being able to shape it or something.

The extra KARMA.


I think so too! But Anarchy makes this unnecessarily complex to impossible. Riggers seem to have it worst, having to decide between all the stuff they need for their core ability and one or two (tops) side amps to not sit on their hands in non-rigging situations.


It kinda looks like it, but scratch the surface and it's hardly any different from traditional GM-player relations, unfortunatly. And this is difficult to rule away with a quick house rule without changing core mechanisms entirely. Better use MGME and SR4A or SR5, or a FATE or PbtA hack if you're looking for simplified rules.

I consider this a feature, not a bug. Every player comes to the table with some other asinine impression of what their character's time is worth; countless hours have been spent in negotiation without getting to the meat of the run. Having the Johnson slip you a piece of paper (or in this case, an encrypted text) can preserve the concept of the negotiation without getting bogged down in minutiae.


I guess where I come off on this is that the abstract nature of the rules, and the fact that archetypes and races have been untied even more, that I think a player can attempt most of these things without having to worry if their numbers are perfect for that situation. Riggers DO seem to need the most love (as always ) but I don't think it's necessarily impossible. One quick note: I haven't gotten a chance to actually play anarchy yet; so I don't want to claim any authority here. ON THE SURFACE it looks like it would work.


It could have gone farther, sure. However, I think it definitely leans towards the player agency side, especially compared to SR5 and more traditional systems. Of course, other games do the narrative method better, I won't argue that, but SR is in it's history a GM run game; I think going that extra step may be a bridge too far. I'd like to give it a few months and see if people think the way it's setup is cumbersome, or if the 'traditional' roles seem to make sense.

-DrZ

+1

@DrZ - I have two groups now running SRA and both have riggers (one dwarf, one troll). They both work just fine. The extra attacks and movement that drones offer make them formidable in combat and useful in narrative/non-combat. Shadow Amps and Karma are the great equalizers in Anarchy. Where they need work is in vehicle rules, specifically: durability (does it act as a Condition Monitor or not?), and how the Matrix interacts with vehicles (can drones take Matrix damage or not?). It would be nice if it was clearer, but you can play it either way (I have).

It says that "no runner wants to be caught dead" on this vehicle, which is
1.) Clearly a hyperbolic, subjective statement and not a statistic.
2.) Not an indication that the extreme opposite has to be true. "Nobody wants to wear rags like these" does not equal "everybody wants a $10000 suit".


Yeah, the layout doesn't include an all-caps "hey, in case you wonder why we have that background and everything" which some people seem to need, so I guess you can blame it on the layout.

Seriously, there are points which are simply not worth discussing.

To answer your second question, at the point I explained several times in this topic: the GM has the big picture, the players don't. So I have no way of knowing if the GM is making stuff up or if the last encounter is linked to the general plot. Hence the thrill.

That's the first thing that makes your comment on my behaviour irrelevant. The second thing is that you mistake narrative for plot here. The players are shaping the narrative in every RPG where you're not railroaded. The very idea of every RPG is that your actions as a PC affect the world. Having the players not being able to change the universe or general plot past their characters' actions is entirely different than saying you don't want players to control the narrative.



1) That's kind of our point since the beginning. Clearly a subjective statements has nothing to do there. If it was a hyperbolic statement based on an objective stuff, no one would care.
2) Your comparison is not valid. The dodge scoot is not a rag. It's casual clothes. Sure wearing casual working suits or clothes will get you jeers from sprawlers. Then reread what you wrote using "casual clothes" .

How is that incompatible with the idea that the face is still the star of negociation and the gunbunny the star of the fight? How is that even impossible in SR1-5? Do your PCs really forbid the troll to talk during negociation phases? Did you read the post I was answering (since I'm "other people")? The idea was that it was unfair that the sam had more actions during fight and he HAD to weigh in during social interaction.

It's really easy to give player more agency than SR5 does. SR1-4 did that already. I mean, I see your point, but it still is, from my experience and my expectations, underwhelming enough that I won't bother with it, especially since it enforces classes lite by favor of its (for a shadowrun game) extremely restrictive chargen rules and further entrenches the magerun problem. I am, however, not sure the authors even consider magerun to be a problem.

Yes, but apart from the claim that in-universe descriptions are not supposed to be there, you (and hermit) also claimed that the statement was somehow douchy and/or somehow offensive, and I'm still not seeing it.


The "voice" of the description clearly considers the Scoot to be an inferior piece of drek. Obviously, going from a different premise leads to a different conclusion.

It's clear this (and previous books) were written with a "voice". Some people's subjective opinions didn't care for it. I'm not positive it's worth rehashing much beyond that. You either like it, feel neutral about it, or dislike it. The "voice" continued in anarchy, which again, some people didn't like. I think that's a valid criticism, even if I don't mind the voice.

I'm on a phone so I'll make it brief, but I think certain people in the thread like anarchy, some dislike it for not going far enough, others have a beef with certain implementations. I'm curious about the issues people see in the third group, because I am having trouble seeing your POV.

-DrZ

I cited two examples of the book's voice's douchiness, and this was none of them. I never claimed this specific quote to be offensive, but inappropriately in-character (written in a voice, if you will) in rules text, no matter the text's layout. Clearly, we don't agree on whether the text or the layout takes precedence in the nature of the text, though.

And I said since the beginning that if the statement was clearly in character, I wouldn't care. There are plenty of shadowtalks using this douchy tone. Honestly, if you don't see how someone despising people for riding a convenient scoot is a douchy attitude, I can't do anything for you. And since the problem has always been about it being supposed to be out of character, I'd say you're still shifting the point.



The reproach is precisely that this voice changed of tone. It didn't "continue". It changed of tone.

The narrator used to sound like a veteran runner, not a poser. That's to say that instead of imposing his prejudice on you and being despising (That's how strong you are, duh), he would try to tell you to give up on your prejudice before entering the shadows. Things are not what they seem to be, they're unpredictable, be careful cause the geek with his glasses could bring the hell of four elementals on you, the little cute elf will cut you with a monofilament before you blink while the ugly troll might actually kindly introduce you to the people in the pub. He was just an old guy who sounded like he had seen too much to pretend he knew much.

Again, your argument is built from the implicit premise that the Scoot is actually a decent ride, and "the voice" only dismisses it because it doesn't meet his douchy standards.

SR1: "An electric intra-city scooter"
Rigger Black Book: "A perfect recreational ride, and a great emergency vehicle to carry in your trunk*. The Dodge Scoot is designed to operate under pedal or electric power, and GridLink access is built in. Available in a wide range of designer colors and custom paint jobs, and corporate logos are a specialty. The Scoot is just the thing for short-distance suburban or recreational travel, or corporate-compound hops." Shadowtalk comment: "For munchkins only".
SR2: "An electric intra-city scooter"
Rigger 2: "This electric-powered scooter is perfect for whizzing down city streets"
SR3: "This electric-powered scooter is perfect for whizzing down city streets"
Rigger 3: "The Scoot is an electrically powered scooter. Designed for urban commuting, the Scoot is an inexpensive option to public transportation that is affordable and ecologically friendly. Among young upwardly mobile urban professionals, it is the best selling bike on the market."
SR4: "This electric-powered scooter is perfect for whizzing down city streets. Compact and affordable, the Scoot is available in a wide variety of colors, and the plastic chassis can be shop-modified to customer specs."

I seem to remember SR4 didn't have a rigger 4, and I quite don't remember nor care what SR5 is saying. My implicit premise that the Scoot is a decent and convenient ride has thus actually been a fact in 4 editions of shadowrun. It merely gets an ironic shadowtalk comment in RBB that's certainly not equivalent to the description in SRA.

I have had characters actually use the Scoot. Not only is is Cheap, it is ubiquitous in the city. You blend with the masses and do not stand out.
Of course, if you are using it to run away from Corporate Security, you may have issues.