Didn't you know, we are all rabid fanboys. We have no other way of expressing ourselves.

It's SR, how could it not be?

How's that for fanboy?

You are my fanboy king!

Well, with all the general background they give, adapting any real-life locale to a SR setting should not be so hard. If you don't want to do that, you can always buy background books, though. *shrugs*

You're wring. There are an entire chapter on skills, each category of skills and ways to use them take few page each.

I'm assuming this should really be "Initiative and Edge".

Typo?

fold out north american map in SR2? unless it was something special for the limited edition hardback i dont recall finding anything like that in my copy...

huh, what? well well, this will create a outcry from the clinton camp
sex, drugs, weapons and organlegging all in one book, this must be bad for the collective us mental state

Then you bought a used book without the map or you have missed it. There's a foldout map of North America right at the end. On one side you have North America and on the other you have one map of Seattle and one of Salish Shidhe Counsil.

uh, i had missed it

all these years and i have been thinking it was just another page with a seattle map on one side and the surounding are on the other

I know a fair number of 12 year olds. I have even *gasp* been a 12 year old. You know what? James is dead on the money when it comes to them.

~J

How could he be dead on the money? It's not true. It's a crock. A giant load of Shit.

Like I said, crawl out of the basement occasionally, live a little.

thing is that often games with character have all kinds of wierd systems. hell, deadlands: wierd west uses dice, cards and poker chips left right and center. keeping track of it all can induce nightmares

but in the end its a fun game, partly as the books are written as you would expect a old fashion cowboy to speak

wotc's problem is that they are making books that are rules first, flavor last most of the time. this means that they try to use modern words in very specific ways to make sure that its not missunderstood. i think its their magic: the gathering experience that shows as there they had to make sure that the cards effect was understandable only one way, and with as few words as possible.

one major character effect in the sr books have allways been shadowtalk as it gives you a feel of the mentality and so on of the people that make up the world.

problem is that no BBB have ever contained shadowtalk. closest thing is the "how it came to pass" section in the start of the book.

but hey, envision a elf in armani suit, a orc or troll in leather jacket and blue jeans and a world kinda similar to our own but where everything that could go evil have gone evil and your getting a very nice image of how things work.

but to have that one needs cops thats overworked, underpayed, 99% corrupt and selfcentered. corps that dont care about anything but the bottom line. mafia and similar thats running rampant. and then you drop the characters in the middle of it.

thing is that lone star have stepped away from their shoot first mentality. the mafia have gone underground. hell, even aztelan have become respectable

so if one wants gritty. take your avarage near future sci-fi, mix in some film noir and frontier town westerns. then trow in a bit tolkien thats gone sour. shake violently and step back

in the end its the gamers that make the game, not the rules or the books. its the way they play it. sure the rules and flavor can reinforce the style, but its ultimatly in the hands of the gamers.

"Opponent loses next turn."

~J

Speak for yourself. You must be thinking of people who represent the outliers of a statistical sampling of twelve year-olds, because I was an idiot when it came to gaming as a twelve year-old (and a horrible munchkin, too), as have been all of the players I know, as has been my observation of gamers at my gaming store, as has been my experience just dealing with twelve year-olds now that I am more twice that age.

I guess maybe if you think Shadowrun should be played like Feng Shui or Mutants & Masterminds it's okay, but I look at my games now and my games back then and we didn't know jack shit. And I would say I'm sorry that it offends your own little closed-off world, but you insulted me, so if I hurt your own sensibilities, then too bad.

Twelve year-olds, especially twelve year-old gamers, are morons.

And I bring up the issue of "gritty" because of the numerous references I've read by freelancers and playtesters who said they want and that Shadowrun is moving in that direction, so it's not just my position. Indeed, it's the party line. And given these two facts, I think Fanpro is being incredibly naive if they think it will work.

No. Shadowrun gang names are cheesy.

And yes, I do. My gaming group has a higher level of expectations than tolerating me pulling something out of my ass. Did you not read my posts in the "running multiple characters" thread? I write at least a paragraph plus a 25 item fill-in-the-blank bio template for Stuffer Shack clerks.

Grow a stronger stomach.

Do it.

I dare you. I double dare you to call me stupid.

You've been a condescending dick to me since I came here, but at least I have the balls to call you one outright and not fuck around like I'm so special that I can made some snide offhand remark and not get called on it.

Well, in that case, I stand corrected. And, I hope it's not the last time today I say I was wrong about comments on this topic.

And, I haven't read that topic yet. Going there now.

No more a moron than some guy posting on the internet that all 12 year olds are morons.

Look, 12 year olds play like 12 year olds. Give them a book and some dice, their gonna make bad ass characters and kill lots of bad ass enemies and get tons of loot. And they will have fun doing it. I'm sure you did. I did.

Calling them morons for it is like calling a 7 year old a moron becuase he's playing with his GI Joe wrong. "What? No you can't shoot that guy at the other end of the room with your pistol - not enough range! And whats this? A light saber on his back?!?! GI Joe didn't have a light saber!! Jeeze what a moron."

You sir need some perspective. And a life.


And you know what I've found? If an adult/mature player leads some of these 12 year olds through a game session, then they actually play pretty good. I've done it. Seen it done. Just did it last weekend in fact with my own kids. First game, first characters, first session. Went great. And no, it was not SR.

Pot, this is the kettle. You're black.

And considering D20 modern is D20, find me anything in any edition of Shadowrun that could not reasonably be added to D20 Modern. It's D20. You could add Blue Rose shit. You could add Dark Sun shit. You could add superheros and fallen angels. You could add stuff from The Red Star. That's the point of D20 - you can add anything from any suppliment with a minor amount of tinkering.

This complaint is like saying, "This new edition is like a cyberpunk-magical version of GURPS with different rules!"

Well... duh.

And in defense of Shadowrun 4th being 'for 12 year olds'... The first time I played SR, I was 12. Just because the players can suck doesn't mean the game has to. So quiet, you!

QED

My neighbours' daughter is ten, and has a far less single-minded attitude than this guy.

Little kids can play SR good too (Well not too little). My little brother and his friend make the best Otaku we've seen! They had fun, we had fun. With a little bit of time with the book and a little bit of explanation they where roleplaying with everyone else.

Actually, I specifically meant D20 Modern. Just that specific game. As in, none of this really can't be added to it and end up breaking the intended flavor. Adding alien interplanetary warfleets to DnD and giving them technology only would utterly rape the flavor of that game. Sadly, I'm speaking from experience.

My point was that, based in just the artwork and table of contents, this could easily be a D20 Modern book. This just doesn't have the feel of Shadowrun to me so far. If I really wanted to see something that focuses heavily on advanced technology, I'd go buy D20 Future at the local gaming store and run it.

As for GURPS: GURPS is like a genetically-engineered cybernetic steroid-addicted version of D20. You can play everything on it. Even Magic: The Gathering. My god, I've never seen a system with so many rulebooks and ways to adapt games to it before that game.

Yes many that are 12 years old haven't had the time or the opportunity to have learned all the things that many adults have. Things like "making broad, absolute generalizations is usually a quick path to showing people that you are an intellectually lazy dumbass."

Could it be because not everyone nods to the drumbeat of the [vocal] "majority"?

Despite my severe dislike of the ten tons of rules... it has my eternal gratitude for GURPS: Uplift. That series was crying out for an RPG for ages.

That's why it sucks to be right all the time.

They are.

I have no reason not to think this. It's not like they have the money to do a real market research program. AFAIK it's all based on guess work of what they think people want, which is dangerously naive.

I never said that. I said it wasn't useful to me. I don't care about you.

Which is my perogative. I don't like what I've seen, I don't trust the math (if there actually is any behind it), and I don't trust Fanpro any more based on recent history

Good for you. I have not, and have no inclination or intention of spending time with more of them to "convince me" otherwise.

In an attempt to totally derail the thread:

As an aside i'm currently trying to play Jubal Early, except in the Black Company setting. Obviously not as a space traveling bounty hunter, but the general persona. I've had to make some allowances, such as playing before he becomes a bounty hunter. Also before he is as badassed skilled.

The rest of my gaming group doesn't know about the source for the character, not even the GM. So imagine the confusion Jubal is generating both in PCs/NPCs and players as he goes off on his odd sensory driven actions, or wierd philosophical takes.

But wait, there is actually i tie-in to your post. I've found it incredibily tough coming up with lines as funny and coherent of actions when you are just a player. It isn't that i'm trying to do this particularly hard character without GM help. A huge chunk of the coolness that is Firefly, the snappy dialogue and plot lines that fit so well together. I can't see a Firefly RPG being nearly as good as shows.

I just finished running a sci-fi RPG set in my own world, which I suppose thematically is a blenderized mix of Master of Orion, Larry Niven, and Xenosaga, using Shadowrun rules. Wierd, I know. Well, my players weren't having ANY of that. Being big Firefly fans, they hijacked that game hardcore. And you know what? They consistently produced awesome, very firefly-ish stuff.

I think what matters is the quality of player, the players' ability to produce good dialogue on the fly, and a comittment to humorous errors. <G>

Excuse me, but what is the link to being a moron and not having time/opportunity to have learned all the things that many adults have ??

Of course they don't have. Of course that they are not gaming like 20ish year old gamers. But with such thoughts, we should use a gaming licence !!
Furthermore, you can also be 45 year old, wanting to do some RPG, and having no clue of what SR is, and so needing those kind of basic information... (this last paragraph was not directly aimed at you blakkie).

And by the way SL James, I haven't insulted you on my previous post, so I would have like you to pay me a little bit more of respect. It is not because we are disagreing on things that you have to behave like this. Even a 12 year old kid won't do such a noise because an adult is not agreeing with him....

Good to hear. Many Shadowrun teams/games have a feel to them that is like Firefly. I should think the system should be a good fit, dropping the magic of course. I know Firefly came up in the main forum in one of those movies/series that are SRish. I hadn't seen Firefly yet at that point, so i didn't say anything when someone countered that at the end of each episode that the team ran off into space. But after watching the series i've found that space in Firefly is symbolicly like the Barrens where SR teams tend to flee when the heat from the law gets too much.