Doesn't seem unlikely. SR6 is pure poison.

For example, Cutting Black, the plot sourcebook for SR6, is an Electrum Best Seller on DTRPG.

That means it has sold between 250 and 500 copies.


The corebook is a Platinum best seller, meaning between 1k and 2k copies.

That is incredibly niche sales numbers. I've backed kickstarted TTRPG projects from first-time creators that moved more units.

Now I'm wondering what D&D's 5e CRB sales were like after a like period of time.

They will blame it on vocal minority hate - and piracy.


D&D5 is obscene. Just looking at some packages on Beyond, they must be building houses out of bundled money instead of bricks.

(I'm sure they'll also explain that their sales numbers on drivethrurpg are only part of their sales, and obviously they have 10 bajillion times as much on the catalyst site, they just aren't releasing those numbers).

to be fair, I don't think it is reasonable to compare to D&D. they're the biggest thing around, and everyone knows that.

also to be fair, they have only one title in the top 100 rpg sales on drivethrurpg, and none in the top 10. and they aren't competing against D&D there, either (unless you count third party D&D books). that title was released about 2 months ago, and only has one review after all that time.

I actually checked DS the other day to see how long it had been since the Big Blowup years ago. That was really it for me: I didn't want to continue to give money to a company that was so openly corrupt that it was coming out via fan forum. I had no interest in 5e and further 6e and have actively been looking for something that worked better for SR than either of those. All else fails, I'd rather just run SR4A, y'know?

I was an essential worker, but then I quit my job when they started wanting me to test people for COVID. My child and wife are both immuno-comprimised and I couldn't risk bringing something back to them. Then I had some health scares, so now I'm stuck at home with nothing more to do than read and write, for real.

It's been a long time, Dumpshock

Depending on how bored you are, the PbP branch is often the busiest part of DumpShock these days. Of course, we could found the revolutionary underground, and work on a kickstarter to reclaim the Shadowrun brand.

My new browser doesn't have all of my old bookmarks, including dumpshock, apparently.

So, do any who have posted here or dropped by, has the COVID-19 set of restrictions encouraged you to re-engage with DS?

(I recognize that restrictions vary country to country.)

Sort of. I'm in Western Australia, which has negligible restrictions at the moment due to having the problem well in hand. However, my American friends are in lockdown so I started a game for them and re-engaged thanks to that.

To paraphrase an Ancient Greek parable, to make the gods laugh, tell them you have COVID well in hand.

Made me curious what's been going on around here, yeah. I know that 6th edition is a thing (I want no part of) but I was curious what the community has been up to of late. I notice the official forums aren't doing much better either.

I miss Shadowrun. I love cyberpunk. But things haven't been in a place where I can enjoy them both lately, though COVID did give me a new group to play with.

If anyone here is bored, check out Behind the Crown. Damn fine story telling, and a few more victims runners needed.

Thanks for the compliments, pbangarth.

Right now they have a shaman and a sammie, but they just lost their main rigger/decker type dude and could use a little electronic assistance.

Or not. The biopocalypse will continue regardless.

Well, the usual facemask deal, but work's been... busy. Supplies are short, there's no autumn or Halloween product coming in for stock, and more and more customers are expecting me and my coworkers to be able to pull product out of our hoops. And on top of that a sudden spike in heat wiped us out of air conditioners...

Me: "I'm sorry sir, we're all out of air conditioners, and so's our distribution center."
Customer: "Well, when are you getting more in?"
Me: "Maybe in four weeks, at least. Maybe."
Customer: "That's not good enough!"

Yeah, I'm an 'essential worker' so nothing's really changed for me except being terrified of when someone's going to get the whole office sick.


That said, I wanted to drop by to validate my numbers.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/sandyp...ster-care-squad

Kickstarter just wrapped up for a game about being a party of roaming magic vetrinarians for giant fantasy end-boss monsters. ~2000 sales at an average of 35 bucks a pop in 30 days.

Cutting Black still hasn't hit gold.

Perhaps it just can't cut it.

Working from home has me so busy I've forgotten to lurk here regularly.

"Well, I can do six weeks. Does that help?"

Like I said before, my life really hasn't changed. I have the advantage though of working overnight. At most there is only 2 other people around me and most of them are at least 20 to 30 ft (6 to 9 meters) away from me at any given moment.

As for logging into DS... I try to hit it up once a day for the Shadowrun discussion board.

Finally, I'm finally going to get in a game. So far we've got my Combat mage, a Troll phy ad with aversions to tech, and a Brain in a Jar cyborg.
We might be getting a troll face (and before anyone says anything, I was able to stat out one who was not bad at his job... and with Wired Reflexes 2, he can move), and maybe a hacker/decker.

My Combat mage was made in such a way to be a jack of all trades (I know, I know, I can hear the groans already), who can do a little bit of hacking and is not half bad with a SMG. I just wanted a character who can be useful no matter what the situation.

I went and looked at the official forums yesterday, and besides being god awful to look at (seriously, red on white?) they seemed about as busy as this forum did.

Been thinking of a Shadowrun conversion for Neon City Overdrive.

It should probably tell the devs something if upon release of a new edition, multiple conversions of the setting to other systems spring up...

..probably just vocal minority hate.

I decided on taking the setting over to GURPS midway through 5th. The editing and murkiness of the writing just made it more of a pain, and 6th is a hot mess. I bought the main book on PDF to give it a fair shake, and regretted it almost immediately.

The thing I miss the most about the older editions is the Lore and world building. In third edition it felt almost real. After that it feels like the writing got lazy, like we'll focus on some overarching meta-plot that has zero long term effect. And they've just been thinly veiled rehashes of the one before.

Most of the players I've had echo this, which has been the problem in getting the group to give shadowrun a go.

I've made the comparison to Augmented Reality before because I'd bought it just then, but it's also applicable to this: AR couldn't be pirated for a long time, because the author just gave it away for free. Still a platinum seller.

Yeah. 3rd had the best world-building and 4th had the easiest-to-learn system. Those are still the best 2 options, although I'd like more of a 1980's cyberpunk-themed game.

I love me some GURPS

I still find myself mostly reaching for the 'Shadows of' series as well as Corporate Download and Sprawl Survival Guide. Hell, even Dragons of the Sixth world was amazing.

I still remember when I first got copies of Cybertechnology and the Street Samurai Catalog and how much I enjoyed reading them.

ShadowTech is still brilliant.

Especially the back and forth between Wolfman and Smiling Bandit!

It's kind of telling that back then, even splat books had a better narrative arc than Cutting Black.

that's not exactly the *highest* bar, mind you.

Sounds like a fun group... good luck...

I'm going to need it.

Now quick question to everyone here: Intuitive Hacking allows a character to perform a single action type without an associated program. And the alternative rules replaces the program level with the attribute. So if both rules are used would it be fair to say that the hits on the action are limited to the Intuition attribute.


Example: A character with Logic 6 / Intuition 4 / Cybercombat 2 and an Attack program 5. Said character takes Matrix Attack as the Intuitive Hacking.

Normally with an attack program he would have 7 dice, but with the alternative rules he would have 8 dice but limited to 5 hits. Would it be fair to say that he has 8 dice for the roll, but since his Intuition is 4, he is limited to 4 hits?

Most of the reason I still hold onto my SR books is the quality of writing (and I'd add Year of the Comet to that list too...I know, I know...)

What's wrong with Year of the Comet?

Ghostwalker, Changelings, SURGE...

Apparently someone felt that even with the plethora of cosmetic cyberware there weren't enough freaks running around, and after Dunkelzahn got offed there needed to be a new wizwurm to be a whipping boy.

See? This is what I mean. Bring up YotC, this is the stuff that comes out

I don't have any problems with SURGE or changelings so I don't see a problem.
Then again I was someone who LOVED 1st edition D&D psionics.

"Real Life Cat Girls! The Gods DO want us to be happy!"

Well, gene-ware and cosmetic bio-ware were & are a thing, too. So SURGE is really just another Pink Mohawk option.

Kind of sad that Denver got turned into draconian North Korea by Hardy, though.

My personal canon is that nothing has happened since Running Wild, myself.

Well since this thread is literally about everything anyway, how about something actually about not being able to meet in person.

Who might be available Saturdays for Game By Discord? Some slots for 2068 4th ED are coming open.

Having fun reading all this stuff at least.

I'm going to eventually have to ask people where to put stuff. I always have problems figuring out where to put stuff.

It was kinda going that way already, just didn't happen at draconian speeds.

There's a huge difference in playability, though.

Cold war, siege scenarios are sustained conflicts - great for Shadowruns.

A draconic enforced total lockdown? That setting is... done.

So removing the UCAS, especially the UCAS military from the Seattle equation? Removes a lot of tension.

Yeah, I don't mind when situations are resolved or the plot moves on, but recent plots are really more "PCs are along for the ride" while important people accomplish important things.

That kept happening in 30 Nights- the author of that took control of the story pacing away from GM and players. There were quite a few situations where if the players try to investigate or move the plot on their own, their stopped with an insurmountable wall: people take cyanide pills for reasons never explained to avoid capture/interrogation. A safe is impenetrable to anything the PCs try (Until it is broken later, when the Almighty Plot says it's the right time). An RFID tracker simply stops working. All electronics are broken and cannot connect to the matrix, except for the ones that can.

The UCAS withdrawal from Seattle might've been interesting, but they have the timeline on events wrong. Or more accurately, they aren't exploiting the timeline well. As it stands:
* Seattle leaves the UCAS
* Sea Dragon moves in, with her own agenda

If you got Free Seattle, you'll know that the Sea Dragon had some influence on Seattle's departure, this wasn't an opportunistic grab. However, the PCs' involvement in this is by... interdraconic theft, that is largely unrelated to the Free Seattle movement

Compare this to the FASA adventure in Native American Nations: The PCs aren't aware of the ramifications of their actions at first, but soon find themselves involved in a plot to stop a toxic mage from causing chaos or disruption among the NAN. The PCs' actions, ultimately, will not strongly affect the metaplot, but the GM and PCs are free to incorporate those consequences into their own timeline.

A better way to include these events might be:
* The "Free Seattle" movement has been a fringe movement for a long time. UCAS presence in Seattle is tense, but it is a stable element. A "free Seattle" is an unknown entity to the NAN, the Tir, and the corps. However, recently it's been gaining traction.
* Rumors in Cutting Black point towards the Sea Dragon fueling some of this movement's rise. What does she have to gain from all of this? etc, etc
* Tensions between the UCAS and megas start to tip corporate interests more towards a free seattle: Sanctions on Ares might lead to legislative reform.
* The corps are split, of course- some prefer Seattle stay in the UCAS, but others would benefit from a restructuring.
* The Tir isn't on board with having a dragon-backed nation next door (Even if Sea Dragon is only an influence, not a ruler like Ghostwalker), and becomes an odd ally of the UCAS.
* Urubia leverages some old allies in the Salish-Shidhe to push against a Free Seattle, to spite the Sea Dragon, if nothing else. This is because the Sea Dragon recently stole one of her eggs. This won't turn out well for Urubia, as she's out of her league. However, Urubia has some draconic-law precedence to back her up since stealing eggs is frowned upon. It's a even more severe breach in protocol to steal one from its mother, as typically the mother petitions for a great dragon to take care of the egg. Great dragons love their traditions, and they aren't keen on anyone starting up conflicts with the namegivers so soon after their own civil war.
* Urubia's influence isn't too significant, so this leads to rifts in the NAN on whether or not to support UCAS. Some wounds don't heal that quick over time, and there's certainly plenty of folks in the NAN that would rather have an unstable, independent nation next door instead of a UCAS military base.
* Now, at the end of it, the Free Seattle movement does succeed. The Sea Dragon's influence isn't as large as she'd like, perhaps a bit undercut since her schemes were outed. The new Seattle is at odds with the Tir, tense with the NAN, and has different relationships with the corps than it did before. Some of the corps that were previously doing well in Seattle are now struggling, and maybe even Renraku, of all corps, makes a comeback.

So instead of Cutting Black being the aftermath, Cutting Black would instead detail how the political tension of Seattle rises. This tension has been fairly dormant in canon since the Tir softened and the NAN also faded from view, but the newcomer Sea Dragon is bringing old rivalries and tensions to bear as she pushes for a free seattle. Cutting Black might talk about some of the things Hestaby was involved in before her exile from draconic society- perhaps this is why the Sea Dragon's taken an interest? Further complicating things is that some of the younger dragons in the area, like Urubia, seem to be at odds with the Sea Dragon. This is unusual, since typically they would get stomped on in such a situation (A la Perianwyr via Ghostwalker). However, rumors about the Sea Dragon stealing Urubia's egg means that Urubia is desperate for any way that she can get her egg back or get revenge on her.

(Although that's another thing- why did the great dragon bother stealing the egg anyways? Typically, the younger dragons petition for an older one to take care of their eggs. If the Sea Dragon wanted one, and asked for it, presumably Urubia would've been thrilled. I digress.

This all would give CGL a way to 1.) Draw out the conflict a bit longer, since it is rife with intrigue; 2.) Make references to some older missions (like the NAN ones), or even make a full comeback of some of these tensions, in an appeal to the older crowd who loved all the intrigue surrounding Seattle. This is tricky, though, since it could come off as CGL rehashing old plotlines. The introduction of draconic intrigue as a "new player" may be enough spice for something like that; 3.) Fully involve players in the plot- instead of "Free Seattle" being a headline in the news, they are now fully involved in new corporate, political, and draconic tensions as a result of this.

I'm sure there's plenty of holes in my plan, I just made it up in like 10 minutes. The intent here is that the PCs are protagonists: even if, ultimately, they have little to no impact on politics at large, they still are a driving part of the plot.

PCs as protagonists? What madness is this? PCs are tourists along for the ride, nothing more! If you let PCs do stuff they might... *shudder* have fun.

See, the worst part about inflicting the plot upon the PCs is that I don't even get to show off how cool my GMPCs NPCs are in comparison to them! I have to show off some author's super cool GMPCs NPCs!

Your 10 minute idea sounds waaaaay better than damn near anything CGL has done in years. I think the problem lies in exactly what Fuel Drop and you mention; that some of the writers seem too intent on writing novels featuring their favorite characters rather than adventures for players and GMs to show off their own characters and make their own mark on the story. They are not, in fact writing adventures, but rather novels or screen plays (bad ones at that).
Maybe they should take some courses on writing adventures or at least remember it is a role playing game, not a movie or whatever.
Of course none of this matters since CGL has long since stopped listening to anything on Dumpshock.