And did so in a very round about way. I would have been satisfied if they'd just said "The setting." and left it at that. Answers that look like a lot at first glance, but the only real truth that you can glean from them is what you read between the lines is what I'd expect from elves and dragons, not from game designers.

that's hardly what's been said. as goodman has stated in another thread, the setting will experience a 0% change, which is slightly more than "the very basics of the setting".

i don't see how that's the case at all. they answered the question that was asked, and they did so clearly and concisely. as an added bonus, you can reasonably derive from that answer what is subject to change. how is that misleading or sneaky?

hmm, i must have missed this "bombshell". when did it get anounced?
yes i know that a fixed target number removes the present function of power but that does not mean that it needs to be removed. high power can still modify a damage resistance test...

I don't think it even says that:

It doesn't actually talk about skills going above 6. It's possible that the author just assumed it as common knowledged that this is SR and that in SR skills go higher than 6. Bad assumption given how much else they are changing.

It mentions "maximum natural rating for attributes", but we know how flexible those maximums were in SR3 once you started plugging in 'ware, which I guess you could call unnatural maximums.

Which basically means when you get enough karma, the body for a human is the same for that or a troll or ork before bio/cyberwear ...

Outside of these forums, there has been no mention of an upper limit to Skills.

As for Attributes, the blurb does not say '6 is the maximum natural rating for attributes (before racial modifiers are applied) at chargen'. It states that 6 is the natural Attribute maximum (plus any appropriate racial modifiers). The natural Attribute maximum for humans in SR3 is 9 (11 with the Exceptional Attribute Edge).

Here is a simple idea. If you like the new rules, use em, if you like the old ones... use them instead. Most of Shadowrun source books are VERY background intensive with a small plop of rules specific stuff. If they give an adequate conversion (I don't see this as being possible, but hey, you can always house rule it) for rules you can continue using source material for 3rd ed games for years to come. I just hope the new Core book isn't the flimsy piece of shite my 3rd Ed book was. Use stronger GLUE you bastards.

You could make that assumption but its still twisting my words. I simply stated that the new system looks like it will put an end to characters with multiple attribute scores at their Racial Maximum. Now go back and read my posts taking into account the latest information about Attributes in SR4.

'If you don't like it, don't use it' posts are deemed by many to be not very constructive, and not very welcome. We all know that this is a viable option.

Does that also apply to my post?

Note the racial modifiers comment indicates this relates specifically to character creation.

And with that back to "comms silence".

the question is, are they going to port those rules over to SR4 or are the 6 (pluss racial mods) going to be the best of the best, end of story?

Not really. I was correcting his comment addressing SR3. Well, it is a question, but it's not one I was raising.

2+2… 2+2…

Pfhor! SR4 is going to incorporate the Marathon universe!

~J

And exactly what answer are you extrapolating from his hints?

The relevant quote from p. 41 SR3

So no my reading of racial maximum rating at chargen is correct. The text goes on to explain what Racial Attribute Limits are in play (they are actually fully described in the character development section of Beyond the Shadows) but the maximum natural rating at chargen in SR3 are those ones quoted above.

Removing combat pools, karma pools, and adding attributes drastically change the setting. Not to mention the actual setting changes imposed by introducing Hackers and removing Deckers and Riggers(and yes I know the function is in, but the name is not)

Patrick, while doing an excellent job in informing the community, is just one person out of many who has little control over the game itself. It is nice and very refreshing that he is keeping us informed with what he can, but in the end he ultimately has little or no say over how the system turns out. For most part it is complete and there will be no more major changes.

He has also been saying "the feel" hasn't changed, however; we insist the announced changes will change the game. So maybe the general perception of what Shadowrun is on DSF is slightly different then Mr. Goodmans.

As far as I can see there is little conclusion jumping. Everything that has been announced has been in line with what I predicted two weeks ago. The direction the game is going is obvious to some people and they make obvious assumptions based on what they see. If you don't like the system now, you certainly wont like it when it releases. And that's okay. The game isn't being made for the majority of the current fans, but for the unwashed masses of D20 and WoD players who have never played Shadowrun before.

There are words I'm seeing all over the SR4 drafts that I've seen so far: "Decker." "Rigger." "Cyberdeck." I still think most of you folks are jumping to unneccessary conclusions about this change.

And while I said there was 0% change in the setting, I feel I should modify that: There's a five-year timeline jump, to accomodate some of the changes that are being made to the tech, but that's the biggest change I can think of off the top of my pointy head. The backstory does not change, the major players don't change much (though I haven't seen the updates to to storyline yet to know what kinds of things happen in the intervening 5 years). There are still great dragons and immortal elves and politics as usual.

The changes you mention are mechanical aspects of the game, not the setting (except the rigger/decker thing, but I've already talked about that).

There's still quite a lot of room for changes both big and small, and as a playtester I actually do have a considerable amount of say over how things turn out. That's why they ask people to playtest it. I have already seen changes from one set of drafts to the next that came about because of playtesting, and I foresee more in the future. I won't get everything I want, but I don't expect to.

If I didn't think what I was doing actually had an impact, I'd have told Rob "thanks but no thanks" when he invited me to playtest the new edition.

It has changed the way some things happen during a game, but the feel of the world is the same, and to me, it runs much more smoothly on a mechanical level.

I'd be somewhat alarmed if my perception of what the game and the game world are didn't differ from some of you here on DSF.

I'd also like to add that it doesn't feel at all dumbed down to me or the guys I'm playtesting with. I'll leave the final analysis of that to you fine folks when the game actually hits the shelves.

Actually, yeah, it is being made for the majority of the fans out there; Dumpshock is hardly a representative sample of the fanbase. And I take some offense to the "unwashed masses" comment, seeing as I'm also a fan of the World of Darkness.

... well you kind of made my point. You do differ from a lot of us here on DSF--not all or even most, just a lot. I am not saying that this is bad. But I dislike the WoD system, past and present. And I dislike the game world. So you're at least different from me on your opinion of what makes a good game world.

You don't seem to think that the game mechanic has anything to do with the feel of the game. You assure us that the feel of the game remains intact. And I assure you, there are lots of us who feel that the game mechanic has a major impact on the feel of the game, can you understand that? Under your argument why not just go to D20? If the mechanic has little to do with the game then it shouldn't be a problem, right?

As for DSF not being representative , well you only need about 100 or so people to determine how 1,000 feel. In national polls they poll about 3,000 people and mathematically that represents the entire country. So when I took a poll asking about Deckers vs Hackers, and 90 people said don't do it, and 60 said yes, then you have your percentage answer. So in that way, DSF is representative of the fan community. It's a shame that the attitude from Fanpro is that if you don't like the system, tough, this is the way it is going to be.

And I have been assured from two different people who are more involved then playtesting, that the game is not being made for the current fans. But for the fans they hope to get. It is a shame that the current mechanic could not be continued, and it will be missed. Not for the game it was, but for the game it could have been. And I wish you (meaning FanPro) had been strait with us (DSF) from the start. This is not a revision, but a whole new game that also uses D6.

And while I have to wait till August to be sure, I am confident that very little will change between now and then. Maybe a few minor revisions of section for editing, or clarity. Maybe they might fine tune the initiative system. But no major revisions are going to happen. Fixed TNs are not going to get replaced, the ridiculous new "dice pool" mechanic will remain etc.

*sigh* What could have been.

To be fair, DSF is is no way a representative sample of the SR community. Most of us are in fact obsessed, making hundreds or even thousands of posts about this game on a forum where what we say seems to have less and less impact. We are the crazed obsessives of the SR community (a fact that many of us are proud of ), which in no way puts us in the "representative sample" category.

<snaps RangerJoe's neck>

No, no bad punnery. I get tortured with that every day in class. Not here.

<looks at the camera>

I'm 21. I shouldn't be so bitter. WHY?!?! Why must this world destroy my youth?!

I wasn't aware that we were all in one location, or even one country. I was under the impression that people on Dumpshock are from all over.