My last post here was in 2010. I remember playing most heavily around the transition between 2e/3e. I'm a member of the RPG Club at my local community college and a few of us want to start a Shadowrun 5e game on the side.
Assuming I haven't played/GM'd since 3e, what's the biggest changes I need to be aware of? What surprises are in store that I need to wrap my head around before game night? Any online tools or apps I should be aware of?
Full Version: Catching Up
The matrix finally does suck to run. 
I know its a matter of option, but in all seriousness, I LOVE the matrix rules for 5th. Its simple, but still quite fun to play with lots of cool options for the player, but not too much to bog down the GM. Using 5th was the first time I had a group that really wanted to use the Matrix as part of the campaign.
And, speaking from my admittedly limited experience GMing the Matrix, this is the first time it seems fairly easy to make up a Grid on the fly
Another big improvement in my mind is also the inclusion of "limits" basically no matter how many dice you roll there is only so many hits that will count towards your success.
I know its a matter of option, but in all seriousness, I LOVE the matrix rules for 5th. Its simple, but still quite fun to play with lots of cool options for the player, but not too much to bog down the GM. Using 5th was the first time I had a group that really wanted to use the Matrix as part of the campaign.
And, speaking from my admittedly limited experience GMing the Matrix, this is the first time it seems fairly easy to make up a Grid on the fly
Another big improvement in my mind is also the inclusion of "limits" basically no matter how many dice you roll there is only so many hits that will count towards your success.
Crash of '64 made the Matrix portable (and so deckers are portable too).
Otaku are now Technomancers (not just Deus's minions anymore, but still untrusted).
Adepts can be Mysitc Adepts and cast spells.
Mages can choose to be Alchemists (but nobody ever does).
Karma Pool is now a stat called Edge (with some expanded uses).
Limits keep dice pool stacking lower (sometimes).
Otaku are now Technomancers (not just Deus's minions anymore, but still untrusted).
Adepts can be Mysitc Adepts and cast spells.
Mages can choose to be Alchemists (but nobody ever does).
Karma Pool is now a stat called Edge (with some expanded uses).
Limits keep dice pool stacking lower (sometimes).
The biggest change was the one from SR3 to SR4. SR5 brought back a few things from SR3 but is still much more similar to SR4. I will go over a few of the major changes as of SR5:
Attributes:
There are eight core Attributes rather than six, and they tend to be lower - partly because they are more powerful. Rather than simply rolling skill, you roll skill plus Attribute, so high Attributes mean more. Karma pool is gone, replaced by a special Attribute called Edge that can be used for things like adding extra dice to a roll or going first in a combat. Magic, rather than starting out at 6, is now a variable stat - it isn't hard to start out with a 6, but if you want to play someone with a weaker Magic, such as 3, you can do that too.
Skills:
Skills start out the same at 6 (7 with a special quality) and are capped at 12/13, a limit unlikely to come up in most games. Specializations are a flat +2 bonus now.
Combat and other tests:
Dice pools are generally Attribute plus skill, with modifiers simply adding or subtracting dice rather than changing the TN, which is a fixed 5 now. Passive defense is the Intuition + Reaction Attributes. Initiative is similar to SR3's, with interrupt actions which can be taken for things such as spell defense or actively dodging (these subtract points from your Initiative score). Armor gives extra dice for soaking damage rather than reducing the power of the attack, also the armor rating is compared to the damage value of an attack - if the armor rating is higher, the attack only does stun damage. Hits are limited by Limits derived from your Attributes or by the Accuracy rating of your weapon.
Matrix:
The Matrix is more omnipresent, with people spending a lot of time in Augmented Reality, and nearly everyone has a commlink (think a smartphone, or the SR3 Pocket Secretary, on steroids). There are even Wireless Bonuses that you can get for having your gear, or even augmentations, hooked up to the Matrix. Deckers stand out from other Matrix users because they use powerful cyberdecks to hack into systems. Decks are roughly similar to SR3, but programs are cheaper and simplified - they only give you small bonuses now. In addition to normal hacking, deckers can Brick gear, or even augmentations, that are hooked up to the Matrix, seizing control of it or slagging it. This is the downside of the aforementioned wireless bonuses. Deckers accumulate an Overwatch Score, and get dumped from the Matrix when it reaches a certain point. Otaku are now technomancers, with their own special Attribute similar to Magic called Resonance, and their own special skills and abilities.
Augmentations:
Bioware no longer has its own arcane rules, but is a staple augmentation like cyberware, although it tends to be more expensive but much more Essence-friendly. Compared to SR3, augmentations will seem less effective and more limited, and the rules for wireless bonuses and bricking mean you often have to choose between losing a bonus or being vulnerable to deckers. I'm not saying you can't make good augmented characters, but it will be a shock, coming in from SR3.
Magic:
Magic is both more diverse and more similar. There a more traditions, but the only real differences are which mental Attribute they roll in addition to Willpower to soak Drain, and which 5 types of spirits they can summon. There is a glut of magical skills compared to SR3. Adepts are a lot more competitive with street samurai now. Spirits can be very powerful, but spells have higher Drain and are easier for targets to resist. SR5 has been accused of being "Magicrun", but compared to SR3, mages are actually weaker. It is only that augmented characters have been nerfed even harder.
Attributes:
There are eight core Attributes rather than six, and they tend to be lower - partly because they are more powerful. Rather than simply rolling skill, you roll skill plus Attribute, so high Attributes mean more. Karma pool is gone, replaced by a special Attribute called Edge that can be used for things like adding extra dice to a roll or going first in a combat. Magic, rather than starting out at 6, is now a variable stat - it isn't hard to start out with a 6, but if you want to play someone with a weaker Magic, such as 3, you can do that too.
Skills:
Skills start out the same at 6 (7 with a special quality) and are capped at 12/13, a limit unlikely to come up in most games. Specializations are a flat +2 bonus now.
Combat and other tests:
Dice pools are generally Attribute plus skill, with modifiers simply adding or subtracting dice rather than changing the TN, which is a fixed 5 now. Passive defense is the Intuition + Reaction Attributes. Initiative is similar to SR3's, with interrupt actions which can be taken for things such as spell defense or actively dodging (these subtract points from your Initiative score). Armor gives extra dice for soaking damage rather than reducing the power of the attack, also the armor rating is compared to the damage value of an attack - if the armor rating is higher, the attack only does stun damage. Hits are limited by Limits derived from your Attributes or by the Accuracy rating of your weapon.
Matrix:
The Matrix is more omnipresent, with people spending a lot of time in Augmented Reality, and nearly everyone has a commlink (think a smartphone, or the SR3 Pocket Secretary, on steroids). There are even Wireless Bonuses that you can get for having your gear, or even augmentations, hooked up to the Matrix. Deckers stand out from other Matrix users because they use powerful cyberdecks to hack into systems. Decks are roughly similar to SR3, but programs are cheaper and simplified - they only give you small bonuses now. In addition to normal hacking, deckers can Brick gear, or even augmentations, that are hooked up to the Matrix, seizing control of it or slagging it. This is the downside of the aforementioned wireless bonuses. Deckers accumulate an Overwatch Score, and get dumped from the Matrix when it reaches a certain point. Otaku are now technomancers, with their own special Attribute similar to Magic called Resonance, and their own special skills and abilities.
Augmentations:
Bioware no longer has its own arcane rules, but is a staple augmentation like cyberware, although it tends to be more expensive but much more Essence-friendly. Compared to SR3, augmentations will seem less effective and more limited, and the rules for wireless bonuses and bricking mean you often have to choose between losing a bonus or being vulnerable to deckers. I'm not saying you can't make good augmented characters, but it will be a shock, coming in from SR3.
Magic:
Magic is both more diverse and more similar. There a more traditions, but the only real differences are which mental Attribute they roll in addition to Willpower to soak Drain, and which 5 types of spirits they can summon. There is a glut of magical skills compared to SR3. Adepts are a lot more competitive with street samurai now. Spirits can be very powerful, but spells have higher Drain and are easier for targets to resist. SR5 has been accused of being "Magicrun", but compared to SR3, mages are actually weaker. It is only that augmented characters have been nerfed even harder.
Thank you all so much!
Just to clarify a few things...
Are you saying that cyberware is susceptible to hacking?
I've always banned Deckers because of the nightmare they were to run (and how much time everyone else spent waiting for things to come back around to them). I'm excited to see them back in the game realistically.
I downloaded the quick start rules so I can wrap my head around it. What about the Lore? I remember it being 2057/2060, I think. So, what caused the Matrix to go wireless? Advances in tech or a catastrophe (or both)?
Last I heard, a certain dragon was president. Then I heard he died. What's the story there?
I feel like I just woke up from a coma. Help me find my way back home, chummers.
Just to clarify a few things...
Are you saying that cyberware is susceptible to hacking?
I've always banned Deckers because of the nightmare they were to run (and how much time everyone else spent waiting for things to come back around to them). I'm excited to see them back in the game realistically.
I downloaded the quick start rules so I can wrap my head around it. What about the Lore? I remember it being 2057/2060, I think. So, what caused the Matrix to go wireless? Advances in tech or a catastrophe (or both)?
Last I heard, a certain dragon was president. Then I heard he died. What's the story there?
I feel like I just woke up from a coma. Help me find my way back home, chummers.
Ooof..
A lot has passed.
A good way to hear some of the chant from over the years is listen into Opti's Neo-Anarchist Podcast : http://neo-anarchist.com/
One of the big things is everything has the capability to hook into the Matrix, even items that you wouldn't expect needed the extra processing cycles to do their job, but that's another tale. You can do things to switch it off, but most average folk just let the devices do their thing. But yeah, as a runner you can find yourself on the short end of a stick if your gear isn't running offline or being sufficiently safeguarded by your decker/firewall.
As for the Matrix, yeah we had another Crash and the Corps response after picking up the pieces was to rewrite the system.
Supposedly for our protection, so you know what THAT'S worth.
Plus it seems they forged this new Matrix on something ..... else. It's still programming, but it's a lot more organic and frankly nobody really understands it all.
Which means the corps are going off half-cocked, as usual.
The Big D.... that's still a bit raw, even after all these years.
The big galoot was always popular, but who knew he could win the big seat in the White house?
Almost looked like the start of a new and brighter day.
Except it turned out that light at the end of the tunnel was the explosion that ripped him and his limo apart, tearing the world a new arsehole in the process. The blast formed a rift between the astral and our world. And things came through... among them Shedim spirits which reanimated corpses to reck things and a Dragon spook who came back from a long trip who has since set up shop in Denver.
But Death isn't always enough to stop a Dragon from playing the Grand Game.
Oh no, the Old Wyrm left a Will behind spreading his treasures far and wide with everyone scrambling to collect or snatch it off the other guy.
Course that didn't sit well with the other Dragons, because they got their way of doing things and dribbling jujus out to us monkeys wasn't one of them.
The Metahuman/Dragon thing has been a long time brewing, with flareups along the way and it is still tense even to this day.
Didn't help one group was autopsying a draco-corpse which in turn led to data that helped create some new weapons designed with wyrm stomping in mind.
Aztechnology are still being douches, both within their borders and outside it, but they did put the hurt on a Sirrug the Slaughterer. They didn't kill it, but hopefully it's still licking its wounds in whatever hole the other Dragons stuffed him into.
This and other things led to a bit of a kerfluffle within the Dragon ranks, with a bit of restacking of the order of things. One of the changes was Hestaby, the Orange Queen of the West coast herself getting knocked down more than a few notches. She is down, but not out and is looking at options to regain some power.
And that is just a few of the highlights, its been a busy decade plus change.
Have a look around, take in the sights and if you got any specific questions just give everyone here a shout and we can get you up to speed on what you want to know.
A lot has passed.
A good way to hear some of the chant from over the years is listen into Opti's Neo-Anarchist Podcast : http://neo-anarchist.com/
One of the big things is everything has the capability to hook into the Matrix, even items that you wouldn't expect needed the extra processing cycles to do their job, but that's another tale. You can do things to switch it off, but most average folk just let the devices do their thing. But yeah, as a runner you can find yourself on the short end of a stick if your gear isn't running offline or being sufficiently safeguarded by your decker/firewall.
As for the Matrix, yeah we had another Crash and the Corps response after picking up the pieces was to rewrite the system.
Supposedly for our protection, so you know what THAT'S worth.
Plus it seems they forged this new Matrix on something ..... else. It's still programming, but it's a lot more organic and frankly nobody really understands it all.
Which means the corps are going off half-cocked, as usual.
The Big D.... that's still a bit raw, even after all these years.
The big galoot was always popular, but who knew he could win the big seat in the White house?
Almost looked like the start of a new and brighter day.
Except it turned out that light at the end of the tunnel was the explosion that ripped him and his limo apart, tearing the world a new arsehole in the process. The blast formed a rift between the astral and our world. And things came through... among them Shedim spirits which reanimated corpses to reck things and a Dragon spook who came back from a long trip who has since set up shop in Denver.
But Death isn't always enough to stop a Dragon from playing the Grand Game.
Oh no, the Old Wyrm left a Will behind spreading his treasures far and wide with everyone scrambling to collect or snatch it off the other guy.
Course that didn't sit well with the other Dragons, because they got their way of doing things and dribbling jujus out to us monkeys wasn't one of them.
The Metahuman/Dragon thing has been a long time brewing, with flareups along the way and it is still tense even to this day.
Didn't help one group was autopsying a draco-corpse which in turn led to data that helped create some new weapons designed with wyrm stomping in mind.
Aztechnology are still being douches, both within their borders and outside it, but they did put the hurt on a Sirrug the Slaughterer. They didn't kill it, but hopefully it's still licking its wounds in whatever hole the other Dragons stuffed him into.
This and other things led to a bit of a kerfluffle within the Dragon ranks, with a bit of restacking of the order of things. One of the changes was Hestaby, the Orange Queen of the West coast herself getting knocked down more than a few notches. She is down, but not out and is looking at options to regain some power.
And that is just a few of the highlights, its been a busy decade plus change.
Have a look around, take in the sights and if you got any specific questions just give everyone here a shout and we can get you up to speed on what you want to know.
One thing not mentioned so far is that they changed how the dice work. Instead of having a fairly fixed number of dice and modifers changing your target number, now your target number is always 5 (so a 5 or a 6 is a success), and modifiers change the number of dice in your pool.
This changes tactics some and the utility of certain spells and cyberware quite a bit. For example, smart links are still good, giving you +2 dice if your wireless is active -- but a decent shooter probably already has at least 10 dice from skill + attribute, so the impact is not quite as essential as having five dice and changing the target number from 4 to 2. Similarly but oppositely, getting a light wound on someone now means taking one die off of their pool, which absolutely can matter, but doesn't usually matter as much as pushing up their target number by 1 used to, IMO.
That change makes the system scale much better than it used to.
They brought that change in for 4th edition, where people promptly found ways to stack things up to get massive dice pools. In fifth they brought in 'limits' which cap how many successes you can count, no matter how many dice you roll or successes you roll. So if yo are using a pistol with an accuracy of five, then your limit when shooting it is five. So that getting up to 18 dice and having some luck to roll seven successes still caps you out at counting five of them.
As for the game world, the latest problem plaguing the world is CFD - I forget exactly what it stands for, but basically rogue nanites start over-writing your brain with a new personality (generally from an AI, although it won't all fit into one brain, sometimes resulting in odd or non-functional behavior). Like secret insect possesion it is not something that happens to player characters, so much as something they have to deal with and worry about. A lot of runs are being set up to get rid of people suspected of having CFD -- often sponsored from within their own companies.
Oh, and the official current year is 2077 or 2078 I believe, although the 5th edition rulebook is at about 2075 (time does advance in SR on a year per year basis).
This changes tactics some and the utility of certain spells and cyberware quite a bit. For example, smart links are still good, giving you +2 dice if your wireless is active -- but a decent shooter probably already has at least 10 dice from skill + attribute, so the impact is not quite as essential as having five dice and changing the target number from 4 to 2. Similarly but oppositely, getting a light wound on someone now means taking one die off of their pool, which absolutely can matter, but doesn't usually matter as much as pushing up their target number by 1 used to, IMO.
That change makes the system scale much better than it used to.
They brought that change in for 4th edition, where people promptly found ways to stack things up to get massive dice pools. In fifth they brought in 'limits' which cap how many successes you can count, no matter how many dice you roll or successes you roll. So if yo are using a pistol with an accuracy of five, then your limit when shooting it is five. So that getting up to 18 dice and having some luck to roll seven successes still caps you out at counting five of them.
As for the game world, the latest problem plaguing the world is CFD - I forget exactly what it stands for, but basically rogue nanites start over-writing your brain with a new personality (generally from an AI, although it won't all fit into one brain, sometimes resulting in odd or non-functional behavior). Like secret insect possesion it is not something that happens to player characters, so much as something they have to deal with and worry about. A lot of runs are being set up to get rid of people suspected of having CFD -- often sponsored from within their own companies.
Oh, and the official current year is 2077 or 2078 I believe, although the 5th edition rulebook is at about 2075 (time does advance in SR on a year per year basis).
QUOTE (Nindaru @ Oct 30 2016, 05:02 AM) 
Are you saying that cyberware is susceptible to hacking?
Yep, CGL attached a "wireless bonus" to various 'ware, using it grants some advantages but on the other hand carries the risk of hacking. Myself and many others didn't like the concept one bit, the sloppy implementation an nonsensical bonuses (your baton extends faster when its wireless is one. I'm not making this up) didn't help.
QUOTE
So, what caused the Matrix to go wireless? Advances in tech or a catastrophe (or both)?
Novatech fell on hard times and wanted to raise money with an IPO. The trading volume from the IPO led to a huge accumulation of computing power on the Boston Stock Exchange or connected to it, which attracted two parties: Deus (The AI from the Renraku Arcology and Technobabel) saw it as an opportunity to bootstrap himself to superinteligence. A gang of dissonant otaku saw the perfect opportunity to remake the Matrix according to their tastes by releasing the Jormungand worm.
Bottom line:
- Crash 2.0, since a lot of the matrix needed to rebuild anyway, they decided to give it in upgrade while they're at it
- The old AIs perished. Post-crash, AIs are no longer "godlike or not at all", but can be ordinary PCs
- Otaku became Technomancers, who have a sort of biological antenna and don't need a datajack anymore (in fact, they react to Essence loss like mages now...which also changed a bit
).On a related note, Rob Boyle expanded on the idea of the AI apocalypse after his tenure as line developer and wrote Eclipse Phase.
QUOTE
Last I heard, a certain dragon was president. Then I heard he died. What's the story there?
As far as the public is concerned he died on the night of the election in a mysterious explosion.
Truth is that he sacrificed himself to power an artifact (the Dragon Heart) which stops the Enemy (the nasty guys from Harlequin's Back) from crossing over into our world.
QUOTE
I feel like I just woke up from a coma. Help me find my way back home, chummers.
Apropos, besides the changed dice system Beta mentioned another large change in the system is that the "Edges and Flaws" system is now called "Qualities" and basically every character has them. Yours is obviously suffering from amnesia (8 Karma), but you seem to have found your home ground (-10 Karma), hopefully you have speedreading (-2).
(long PS)
There also are several things which changed during 4th Edition, and then changed back in 5th: Initiative became a fixed number of Initiative Passes (IPs), then back to the XD6+Y system in 5th. Decks disappeared and deckers became hackers, now they are deckers with decks again. Nanoware became common everywhere and got scaled back again. Various types of Infected became PC options in 4th and then got seriously hosed in 5th. The default character generation was build points, now it's priority again. So don't be confused if you see a hacker with just a commlink and 1 IP
And since you will inevitably stumble upon the results: CGL, the company which owns the rights for PnP Shadowrun now, ran into serious cash shortages in 2010 and nearly went belly-up. A lot of freelancers left over unpaid royalties and accusations of embezzlement, the result were several extremely crappy books obviously pushed out to generate desperately needed cash. The acute troubles are gone, however the whole affair generated enough bitterness to last another decade...
There also are several things which changed during 4th Edition, and then changed back in 5th: Initiative became a fixed number of Initiative Passes (IPs), then back to the XD6+Y system in 5th. Decks disappeared and deckers became hackers, now they are deckers with decks again. Nanoware became common everywhere and got scaled back again. Various types of Infected became PC options in 4th and then got seriously hosed in 5th. The default character generation was build points, now it's priority again. So don't be confused if you see a hacker with just a commlink and 1 IP
And since you will inevitably stumble upon the results: CGL, the company which owns the rights for PnP Shadowrun now, ran into serious cash shortages in 2010 and nearly went belly-up. A lot of freelancers left over unpaid royalties and accusations of embezzlement, the result were several extremely crappy books obviously pushed out to generate desperately needed cash. The acute troubles are gone, however the whole affair generated enough bitterness to last another decade...
QUOTE (Sendaz @ Oct 30 2016, 02:22 AM)
Ooof..
A lot has passed.
...
A lot has passed.
...
Is there a source online for the history, aside from a Timeline? Your synopsis was excellent, but I want more! =)
QUOTE (Sengir @ Nov 2 2016, 11:23 AM)
... hopefully you have speedreading (-2).
Yeah, my brain is slower than it used to be. I've been reading the Core 5e book and I'm struggling to absorb it all!
QUOTE (Nindaru @ Nov 5 2016, 04:33 PM)
Yeah, my brain is slower than it used to be. I've been reading the Core 5e book and I'm struggling to absorb it all!
That's not your brain.
QUOTE (Nindaru @ Nov 5 2016, 10:30 AM)
Is there a source online for the history, aside from a Timeline? Your synopsis was excellent, but I want more! =)
Well, again I would suggest you take the time to listen to Opti's podcasts like I mentioned above to follow SR history through the years.
Yeah it's slow, but fun listening to.
If you want to know what sourcebooks/novels there are you can check out: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Shadowrun_books
It lets you sort by publication date or In-Universe date, though if you do the later it partitions them a bit so you may have to scroll down to see it all.
A lot of 4th & 5th is available in PDF form from RPGdrivethru.com if you are looking for specific source books.
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