Hello everyone.

Just a little background. Several years ago I completed a three year long Earthdawn campaign. I've collected all the material published for the game and it remains one of my all time favorite game systems, largely due to the fact that the game which I ran was my most enjoyable campaign to date.

Shadowrun is my all time favorite game system. I've known for a long while that FASA was intending on crossing over the two game timelines, and I've heard folks mention the notion here and there, but the novel Worlds Without End was my first experience with actual product that introduced the notion. I've owned Harlequin's Back for years but until recently haven't really read it.

Are there any other products that touch on this subject that have been released either by FASA before its demise or by Wizkids since FASA's death that you can clue me in on?

Thanks so much!

Aunty H's SR/ED Crossovers would be a good place to start...

Dragons of the Sixth World may provide some interesting connections, especially if you have the old ED Dragons.pdf. The Earthdawn connection and the Enemy are no longer the focus of the ongoing metaplots but that isn't to say that the links aren't around here and there. Almost every book I've read in the past couple of years has a hidden reference or two for the connaisseur.

There's a copy of the Dragons PDF on my site. You should also read one or two of Tom Dowd's short stories.

Incidentally, the two prequels, "Scars" and "Little Treasures" should be put out in 2005.

In English?

Yes, in English.

IIRC, Jak Koke has had an influence on these two novels getting published in English (along with his own new ED book).

The rights tot he novels have gone back to the writers; Jake Koke's novel "Liferock" was published and Per Aspera claims it'll publish "Scars" and "Little Treasures" in 2005.

Does anybody know what "Scars" and "Little treasures" two books will be dealing with ?

Are we going to see Aina in the 4th world and what she was up to ?

Will we see her interact with other ancients, like Harlequin, Ehran, Oakforest ?

Will we see her interact with any of the dragons, dunkelzahn etc. ?

To be a bastard....
Two big reasons why Worlds Without End sucks:

1) The seemingly inescapable fanfic syndrome of game novels. That is to say, the writing is okay, for a game novel. In terms of regular novels? It's godawful. Not to impugn the author's ability totally, but really... why can't authors of game novels escape this trap?

2) Neatly removes control, influence, or import from anyone engaged in combatting the Enemy/Horrors - especially those who may have been involved in Harlequin's Back. Granted, that's a very small group in any given gameworld, but think about it. Your PCs shed blood, sweat, tears to combat the horrors, and what does Worlds Without End do? It says, "Sorry, your sacrifice and hard work actually meant nothing at all. Once again, you have been showed up by a Great Dragon. What's worse, you've been shown up by an npc." I'm all for people getting showed up by a Great Dragon, sure - provided it happens in-game. To just be informed, "Yeah, Dunkie's sacrifice has saved us all! What a great guy!" is kind of a letdown. It removes any actual reason for HB to be played, should it be considered canon. Furthermore, it removes all OOC mystery to why he died, what caused it, et cetera, should the novel be considered canon.

My two cents. Because I hate game novels. They are a plague on the collective mind of GMs.

I'm in the general camp of people who hates the SR novels (both in writing quality and in what they do to the game line). There are exceptions. I think two. Both by the same author.

I think the novels were given far too much liberty in design, considering they are marked as canon, and also given far too much liberty in "answering" plot lines that the game product writers put in for the players, not the novel authors.

blasphemy. Shadowboxer has claimed that title, now and forevermore. nothing printed before or after has come, or will come, within a light-year of being as ridiculous as that novel.

Remind me what was in that one?

~J

madness. shame, a fair bit of blinding stupidity, and several parts unbelievably poor exposition. it's the one that starts out with a dwarf in Miami trying to track some stuff down with the help of a street sam that has some kind of advanced prototype pistol-drawing machine thingy that accelerates and decelerates his gun faster than physics allow, but the dwarf got killed by some nameless thug halfway through the book and there was a cat shaman that didn't wear clothes and oh god there's bugs in my skin

no, no, that was... Terminus Experiment, which had undead vampires in it. and, see, okay. Terminus Experiment was at least a decent read, as long as you didn't try to pretend it was about SR. it had all the elements of a decent paperback thriller, it just violated everything else written about vampires in SR.

No. The Terminus Experiment.

Damn mfb and his faster, nimble fingers.

Funny, I could have sworn typing something a while back about making sure to reload a page before I posted. Meh.

I dunno, i kinda like SR novels. Even Terminus Experiment. Although the Secrets of Power Trilogy didnt do to much for me.

Bah. I could easily see a good SR novel being done.

~J

Yeah, but too often they seem to omit or alter details that players would otherwise recognize.

I've always thought of the novels in SR as if the author were actually any GM, writing up their run or campaign. As far as writing quality goes, they do a hell of alot better then I would. As far as canon material goes, how many of us actually run a game that is completely by the book? I sure as hell don't. Never will either, partly because I'm to poor tog et caught up on all the books or story lines. You don't like what's in the book ignore it. If your PC's try to cite a novel you're ignoring tell them to stuff it. Done it a couple of times, because it made things easier for me.

my 2 cents

It wouldn't be so bad if they weren't labeled as "canon" (and sometimes I think even the guys who run the franchise don't quite get what that term means and instead use it as interchangably with "official" as some people around here do). But since they are labeled that way, any conflict they produce conflicts directly with the actual rules for the game... and both are equally valid.

Besides, the few I've read pretty much sucked on every level, including the story itself.

I like the theory of the novels being canon. The practice leaves much to be desired.

~J

Oh, come on... Burning Bright was a damn enjoyable read. So was Dead Air.

"Burning Bright" is one of the two exceptions for me (as far as Shadowrun novels I liked). I think the other was "Night's Pawn". "Dead Air" might be good, I never read that one.

i liked the short story collection, Into the Shadows. Findley's books got me into SR--good stuff.

I think House of the Sun left a great deal to be desired. Never read Night's Pawn. Maybe if I find my copy of Dead Air we can share?

Sigh

Man I pray ever night to every pantheon of gods available that some book other than Burning Bright makes me happy.

That said-I try and find something positive in every book, evenif it's not what to do when I manage to actually write on of my own.

Night's Pawn was quite good.

The original trilogy was fun (if over the top), too. Dead Air still stays at the top of my list, though.

Most of the Shadowrun novels are pretty mediocre -- not that this makes them that different from other game tie-in fiction, however. On the other hand, there are a few novels that stand out as being unbelievably good on the tie-in fiction scale (which is to say, they are pretty good novels in their own right). Burning Bright and Night's Pawn, Tom Dowd's two novels, and Nigel Findley's 2XS are some of the best tie-in fiction I've ever read. The best part of these novels, I think, is that the protagonists are all....very human, not over-the-top badass stereotypes, and metaplot-heavy NPCs remain firmly in the background.

I haven't read any of the novels since I read....Black Madonna, I think, where things went from over-the-top to beating my suspension of disbelief with 16-pound sledge (I think that was around when I stopped buying Shadowrun books in general too). It sounds like I didn't miss a whole lot....

Yeah, I agree that the best idea for wrapping up storylines are game adventures that players participate in, not novels where it's resolved in canon by NPCs. I also think the SOTA books are a good way of pushing storylines to closure now without closing them off entirely to players.

It's especially annoying when the novels close storylines that didn't need closing. Like the mystery of Dunkelzahn's assassination. That was a great plot line that hadn't even been around long before it was "solved" by uber-cheese NPCs in a grand storyline which players weren't invited to.

And no, I haven't read 2XS, but from what I know of it, I think I might like it.

you probably would; it does exactly what you're talking about--explore and further existing plotlines, without ending them. House of the Sun is good as well, especially when you compare it to stuff like the DH trilogy. yes, HotS deals with 'big stuff', but it's largely self-contained; it doesn't open up a whole lot, in terms of run ideas, but it doesn't close anything off, either.

House of the Sun was helped by the fact that its events happened so far away from everything.

I liked 2XS and House of the Sun, because although they dealt with big things, they dealt with them in a small enough way that I came away with the feeling that similar things could happen to my character. Of course, I read them before forming the strong opinions about metaplot that I have now, so maybe I should re-read them and see if they turn my stomach now, but I remember at the time I really really liked them.

Wow, such unmitigated glowing admiration... <laugh>

Well, I have many comments to this thread... the first of which is that yes Per Aspera Press will be coming out with Scars next year... likely in March, and Little Treasures later in the year or early 2006.

We actually meant to have Scars out by now, but we've been so busy with our latest hardcover thriller, Singularity that we have delayed our other books a bit. It's been worth it though because Singularity has been getting some awesome reviews and blurbs by big name authors and such and is bound to be one of those books that builds and builds. I think a lot of SF fans will like it.

Anyhow, what started out as a small venture to put out my novel Liferock has turned into a much bigger thing and has taken up a great deal of time and energy.

Regarding the various types of SR novels (at least among those I've had a hand in writing): Dead Air was purposefully meant to be a more typical SR novel in that it dealt with a small, as yet undeveloped are of the SR universe and told a story that largely affects no one outside the story itself. It's a self-contained unit.

OTOH, the three novels that make up the Dragon Heart Saga were crafted as part of a unified effort to shake up both the SR universe and the game line. At the time I was brought in to write them, the SR game line was flailing. The plot and characters were partly my own creation, partly created in collaboration with FASA, most notably Mike Mulvihill. These books were meant to be different, and to stand out. They were designed to resolve a number of larger scale plot elements that were brought up by the election of Dunkelzahn to the presidency of the UCAS and his subsequent assassination... and especially to tie up the thread that Enemy was about to cross-over.

The Dragon Heart Saga in conjunction with the sourcebooks that lead up to the election and the assassination of Dunkelzahn were scripted, with the main intent of renewing interest in Shadowrun. And it worked! A year later Shadowrun had outgrown BattleTech as FASAs best-selling game.

Anyhow, I feel like I'm rambling, but I was hoping context might give you all a better perspective from which to judge my various novels. As for The Terminus Experiment... there's a story there as well. I consider that 3/4 Jonathan's book, even though my name is on it. Suffice it to say that it was nearly a lot worse.. but the full story has to remain a mystery for now; perhaps if you catch me in person after a couple beers, I might tell it. :>

You're never going to please everyone every time.

While I may not have appreciated Terminus Experiment as much as I could have, I really enjoyed the Dragonheart Trilogy and Worlds Without End. But then again, I like the metaplot.

just to clarify... i am in no way put off or bothered by negative comments or criticism about my novels.... i do not expect to be able to please everyone and i appreciate feedback of all kinds...

i've always felt privileged to have been able to contribute so much to Shadowrun universe.... and the last thing i want is my presence to heisenberg the discussion....

While it's been said before I think it bears repeating: Most novels of any sort are crap. Just like most TV. I've found the Shadowrun novels to be better than most. I gotta second how ridiculous the Terminus Experiment is for Shadowrun. Not bad for a splatterpunk horror flick, but not really Shadowrun.

Before I'd even heard of Shadowrun outside Nintendo Power (the issue covering the SNES game), I found Lone Wolf used in a Value Village, and couldn't put it down. Best Shadowrun novel I've ever read, by my favorite Shadowrun author. Interesting trivia, right before his heart attack, GURPS:Illuminati was published by none other than Nigel Findley. And I always felt that House of the Sun opened up (but not a lot) the Immortal Elf/Atlantis connection.