Shadowrun Spin-off Thread

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Faylar

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Moderator EDIT: OK, so, as per request I attempted to move the Shadowrun tangent out of the Irrational Hatreds thread. But something went horribly wrong, unfortunately. See last time I did the whole spin-off thread thing, someone was mad at me for having their post as first since "they didn't start the thread", so this time I tried starting the thread first with an initial post of explanation by me, and then moving the posts. Except when I moved the posts it automatically placed them in order of the time they were posted, bypassing my OP. So, I figured I'd just have to do an edit in the first post (like I'm doing now), and I went ahead and deleated my original post.

And that deleted the entire thread. There's no trace of it on the forum software.

So all the original posts I transferred are lost :sad:

This is the earliest reply left from those I'd not trransferred yet, everything before this is gone. Sorry folks.




care to share that?
Sure. Remind me if I forget. Im at work atm. :smile:
 
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Magic isn't permanent either. Its a condition of the world that is always in flux. Going all in on something that will once again dissapear is a fools errand.

Magic comes and goes in cycles based on the Mayan Long Count, which is approx. 5000 years. As far as most people are concerned, it lasts forever. I'm pretty sure that wasn't common knowledge unless you were an immortal elf or a dragon.

No to mention, the return of nagic herslds the return of world destroying gods that feed on magic.
Dunkelzahn knew this and was preparing us for it. Tech understanding and combatting magic was our only hope.
The new writers seem to have abandoned that though.

Yeah, I think abandoned is the correct word. In the early day after Shadowrun left FASA Corporation, developers were still in contact and there was lots of crossover stuff with Earthdawn. This doesn't happen any more and much of the connections are slowly being eroded and they are looking at other things.
 
Magic comes and goes in cycles based on the Mayan Long Count, which is approx. 5000 years. As far as most people are concerned, it lasts forever. I'm pretty sure that wasn't common knowledge unless you were an immortal elf or a dragon.



Yeah, I think abandoned is the correct word. In the early day after Shadowrun left FASA Corporation, developers were still in contact and there was lots of crossover stuff with Earthdawn. This doesn't happen any more and much of the connections are slowly being eroded and they are looking at other things.
Yep. As I understood it, the Dragons saw human tech and were all like "fuck... this shit is a game changer" and then started to steer metahumanity as opposed to just being awake and doing their thing as normal for the cycle.
As Fasa split and its assets were sold off, this all went to the dumpster.
However, it was there and is the main reason I prefer 2 to 3 over later editions.
 
Yep. As I understood it, the Dragons saw human tech and were all like "fuck... this shit is a game changer" and then started to steer metahumanity as opposed to just being awake and doing their thing as normal for the cycle.
As Fasa split and its assets were sold off, this all went to the dumpster.
However, it was there and is the main reason I prefer 2 to 3 over later editions.

Damn, all this Shadowrun talk is making me want to grab my books and read the hell out of them again.
 
Love the snark.

Anyway, Cyberpunk has one line of development, spurred by multiple wars. And a societal collapse, due to the economy.

Shadow run has the emergence of multiple mutants that become discrete species, technological development, magic and a Native American magical apocalypse.

I don’t need to manufacture reasons not to like Shaddowrun. They’re the same reasons some people like it.

And you don’t need to manufacture reasons why my disinterest offends you. But then, if you’re offended by a difference in taste and are taking it personally, that’s not my problem.
It’s not the taste, it’s you getting practically every single “fact” wrong when you try to come up with a reason that isn’t just “Magic in Cyberpunk”.
 
Is 60 years a handful? The world started to fall apart in the 90's. Before the Awakening you had wars, economic collapse, a nuclear detonation, plague, earthquakes, rise of corporations, etc. The earliest start for a campaign is 2050, which is 39 years after 2011.

The problem in Shadowrun, IMO, is that you had all these fantasy racial groups that had cultural identities as if they'd been around for centuries when they'd actually been around for barely a generation.

Imagine some weird thing happened and a random selection people started being born around the world with, I dunno, blue skin. What's your over-under on multiple independent nations of blue-skinners being founded worldwide within 15-20 years of this happening?

Even on a purely local level, it doesn't make sense: Sure, you'd have people who disown their children when they turn into elves or whatever. But there'd be lots of people who just, ya know, wouldn't do that. And even if they did, those scars would still be in living memory. Virtually every elf you bump into on the street has human grandparents and most of them probably have human parents. Instead you somehow end up with, for example, multigenerational elven clans who somehow wield hereditary power despite the fact that they're all simultaneously first generation elves.

I like Shadowrun. But you can't spend any serious time looking at the history or it all falls apart.
 
The problem in Shadowrun, IMO, is that you had all these fantasy racial groups that had cultural identities as if they'd been around for centuries when they'd actually been around for barely a generation.

Imagine some weird thing happened and a random selection people started being born around the world with, I dunno, blue skin. What's your over-under on multiple independent nations of blue-skinners being founded worldwide within 15-20 years of this happening?

Even on a purely local level, it doesn't make sense: Sure, you'd have people who disown their children when they turn into elves or whatever. But there'd be lots of people who just, ya know, wouldn't do that. And even if they did, those scars would still be in living memory. Virtually every elf you bump into on the street has human grandparents and most of them probably have human parents. Instead you somehow end up with, for example, multigenerational elven clans who somehow wield hereditary power despite the fact that they're all simultaneously first generation elves.

I like Shadowrun. But you can't spend any serious time looking at the history or it all falls apart.
Elves were around since the last magic age. It was implied but not outright stated afik.
Sperethiel was taught to elves and survived. Other characteristics arose from social status or racial behaviours (dwarves dig).
You are already 3 gens in for orks and trolls. Maybe more. They mature fast and die early.

A lot of this is covered in the lore. Despite some stuff that does exist as wtf... it was rather well thought out.
Honestly what setting doesn't have wtf parts though?
 
It’s not the taste, it’s you getting practically every single “fact” wrong when you try to come up with a reason that isn’t just “Magic in Cyberpunk”.
No. You're getting all offended at my irrational dislike of the last 30 years. I've held Shadorun in contempt since I first heard of it, back in about 1990.

You wont persuade me I'm wrong because I don't want to be right.
 
No. You're getting all offended at my irrational dislike of the last 30 years. I've held Shadorun in contempt since I first heard of it, back in about 1990.

You wont persuade me I'm wrong because I don't want to be right.
And if you’d led with that, it would be cool, it is the Irrational Hatreds thread.

But when you try to justify it by ignoring easily known facts about the game, you’re attempting to rationally justify it with provable horseshit.
 
CRKrueger you seem to have a good knowledge of Shadowrun. If one were to get an edition would it be 2nd or 3rd?
 
The problem in Shadowrun, IMO, is that you had all these fantasy racial groups that had cultural identities as if they'd been around for centuries when they'd actually been around for barely a generation.

Imagine some weird thing happened and a random selection people started being born around the world with, I dunno, blue skin. What's your over-under on multiple independent nations of blue-skinners being founded worldwide within 15-20 years of this happening?

Even on a purely local level, it doesn't make sense: Sure, you'd have people who disown their children when they turn into elves or whatever. But there'd be lots of people who just, ya know, wouldn't do that. And even if they did, those scars would still be in living memory. Virtually every elf you bump into on the street has human grandparents and most of them probably have human parents. Instead you somehow end up with, for example, multigenerational elven clans who somehow wield hereditary power despite the fact that they're all simultaneously first generation elves.

I like Shadowrun. But you can't spend any serious time looking at the history or it all falls apart.
You know the creation of the two elven nations was a plan carefully constructed over hundred of years because certain elves are actually immortal, right? Oregon was first Indian land, which the NAN Council granted to the elves who were allied with the natives. They then broke away to form Tir Tairngire. Tir Na Nog/Ireland also was the culmination of a long-term plan.

Imagine you’re one of the Blue Skinned, in a world where psionics now exists, and there’s blue skins, some of whom are extremely powerful psionics, who tell you your people have an ancient legacy that you can inherit, that you’re superior to the normals, and there’s lands created for your people to live in. Would blue-skinned buy it? Some of them, line, and sinker, most likely. But more elves live outside of the Tirs, then live inside them.

Is it bullshit? Of course, the culture of the Tirs is nothing like the elves of Earthdawn. All this First Age Tolkien crap is just con and propaganda meant to keep the leaders in power and the people focused and obedient...like any good Cyberpunk government.

Does the setting have holes? Of course it does. All settings do. But what I see a lot is people taking a cursory glance at the main rule book, if that, and then assuming everything else. Just like CP2020, SR has a “How it came to pass” section, and then details the setting through tons of supplements.
 
I sort of get what hes getting at though. I disagree that you are manufacturing anything but you dont seem to have a solid grasp of what Shadowrun is about and post a lot of assumptions.
Thats okay though. Ive sworn away from things over false assumptions too.
If you dont want to deepdive into it its okay, but please understand that those of us that like it see a lot of these arguments floating around to trash it and drum up falsehoods about it on purpose.
I say the same thing about 4e D&D....and



nothing....
 
And if you’d led with that, it would be cool, it is the Irrational Hatreds thread.

But when you try to justify it by ignoring easily known facts about the game, you’re attempting to rationally justify it with provable horseshit.
Listen you self important little twat. I don't care what you think, what you claim to know or how many editions you have of a game I dislike from its core conceit outwards.

You keep trying to tell me I'm wrong. So what? I don't like Shadowrun. I haven't liked it since before some people on this board were born. Nothing you say ir do is going to change that.

So why is it so fucking important why I don't like it? It makes no difference to you what I like. Just as it makes no difference to me what you like.

So leave it. Drop the matter.

It's an issue of taste, so nobody is right or wrong.
 
Listen you self important little twat. I don't care what you think, what you claim to know or how many editions you have of a game I dislike from its core conceit outwards.

You keep trying to tell me I'm wrong. So what? I don't like Shadowrun. I haven't liked it since before some people on this board were born. Nothing you say ir do is going to change that.

So why is it so fucking important why I don't like it? It makes no difference to you what I like. Just as it makes no difference to me what you like.

So leave it. Drop the matter.

It's an issue of taste, so nobody is right or wrong.
There's taste, sure.

Saying you would need to go through and remove Creation and Teleport spells from Shadowrun where there aren't any at all, isn't taste.

It's not important that you like it, I don't give a fuck if you like it or not. But, if you're going to just spout stuff at random that's objectively wrong, you will be corrected.

But, Kudos for proving your hatred is actual Hatred, and it is totally irrational. :thumbsup:
 
I would start with Second. Third is basically Second with Houserules to bring more crunch. So use Second as a foundation and add in Third to taste.
Pretty much. I preferred 3rd because some of that crunch actually made some things work better. Also 3rd is a continuation of the timeline so starting in 2nd gives you a wider look.
 
My basic problem with Shadowrun and its magic is that it feels redundant in a lot of ways. Just looking at Gibson's early works, he is playing with the way technology evokes spiritual ideas, with cyberspace being a kind of astral plane, and AIs taking on the identities of supernatural beings. Shadowrun has that, but it also has a literal astral plane with supernatural entities. It's a hat on a hat.
 
Pretty much. I preferred 3rd because some of that crunch actually made some things work better. Also 3rd is a continuation of the timeline so starting in 2nd gives you a wider look.

also where I’ve decided to go With my hacking. I feel that 4e on feels very cumbersome in a lot of ways. It might be editing, but the sheer bulk of the thing is a bit much.
 
My basic problem with Shadowrun and its magic is that it feels redundant in a lot of ways. Just looking at Gibson's early works, he is playing with the way technology evokes spiritual ideas, with cyberspace being a kind of astral plane, and AIs taking on the identities of supernatural beings. Shadowrun has that, but it also has a literal astral plane with supernatural entities. It's a hat on a hat.
1582908347536.png

i sort of dislike sorcery and the interaction with the astral. However, I like the idea of making our own astral that everyone can access with a little gizmo in their head. I think it hits on some interesting themes - the commoditization of power, what real power is, etc.

we should probably start a whole Shadowrun thread.
 
also where I’ve decided to go With my hacking. I feel that 4e on feels very cumbersome in a lot of ways. It might be editing, but the sheer bulk of the thing is a bit much.
I see 4e as an alternate reality and less a continuation. They not only dropped story elements, they changed in game slang and also the general vibe.
It became less vs and more bridging divides. Cyberpunk became transhumanism, corps got sanitized, runners became more celebrity.
It was a decent game but it was like D&D comparing greyhawk to forgotten realms.
The other thing is that the rules completely fail to allow a power curve and utterly fall apart if you try and play a superhuman (which is inevitable) so they throw arbitrary caps which lead to "whats the point of doing this otherwise cool thing?"
 
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i sort of dislike sorcery and the interaction with the astral. However, I like the idea of making our own astral that everyone can access with a little gizmo in their head. I think it hits on some interesting themes - the commoditization of power, what real power is, etc.

we should probably start a whole Shadowrun thread.
Shadowrun isn't Gibson's work. If you go there looking for that you are surely to be dissapointed. It is it's own thing.

Edit: i was apparently replying to who you replied to. Need coffee. Sorry
 
You know the creation of the two elven nations was a plan carefully constructed over hundred of years because certain elves are actually immortal, right?

I don't. Neither did the Tir Na Nog supplement that I was talking about. (It's been a long time since I originally looked at this stuff, but a quick review confirms: Liam O'Connor was actually a spike baby, not an immortal, and the Danaan Families were explicitly NOT immortal elves.)

If neither the rulebook nor the supplement dedicated to a particular section of the game world can reveal the "truly true truths that are super-true" which make the game world make sense because the truly-true truths that are super-true are buried in some other random corner of an overly ornate and secret-obsessed game line, then you have successfully transitioned this conversation from irrational hatreds in RPGs to completely rational hatreds in RPGs.
 
I don't. Neither did the Tir Na Nog supplement that I was talking about. (It's been a long time since I originally looked at this stuff, but a quick review confirms: Liam O'Connor was actually a spike baby, not an immortal, and the Danaan Families were explicitly NOT immortal elves.)

If neither the rulebook nor the supplement dedicated to a particular section of the game world can reveal the "truly true truths that are super-true" which make the game world make sense because the truly-true truths that are super-true are buried in some other random corner of an overly ornate and secret-obsessed game line, then you have successfully transitioned this conversation from irrational hatreds in RPGs to completely rational hatreds in RPGs.
The scope of Shadowrun lore is included in the modules and novels too. Even I have not had access to all of it. But as CR stated it, this is the general understanding, especially among the general Shadowrun community like the one that used to be in Shadowland 6.

Harlequin is the overall architect of the 6th world and is in fact an immortal elf who has battled the Horrors not once, but frequently over the ages.
 
The scope of Shadowrun lore is included in the modules and novels too. Even I have not had access to all of it. But as CR stated it, this is the general understanding, especially among the general Shadowrun community like the one that used to be in Shadowland 6.

Harlequin is the overall architect of the 6th world and is in fact an immortal elf who has battled the Horrors not once, but frequently over the ages.

Adding, the ccouncil of Elders did have Ehlan the Scribe, for one. He is about as Immortal as they come. He chopped off Halequin's ear after beating him in a duel in the renaissance If I remember right. So maybe Tir Na'Nog was new elves, the Ancient ones most assuredly had a hand in the creation of the nations as it was the same architects for both, the Council of Elders.
 
I don't. Neither did the Tir Na Nog supplement that I was talking about. (It's been a long time since I originally looked at this stuff, but a quick review confirms: Liam O'Connor was actually a spike baby, not an immortal, and the Danaan Families were explicitly NOT immortal elves.)

If neither the rulebook nor the supplement dedicated to a particular section of the game world can reveal the "truly true truths that are super-true" which make the game world make sense because the truly-true truths that are super-true are buried in some other random corner of an overly ornate and secret-obsessed game line, then you have successfully transitioned this conversation from irrational hatreds in RPGs to completely rational hatreds in RPGs.
Well, many of the Danaan families have Immortal Elves, they're just not actually old, they just possess the gene. Lady Brane Deigh, for example, is an Immortal Elf, and while she is not ancient, she's advised by and possibly related to Alachia, an ancient elf.

As far as the secrets go, you're totally right, and it's a very rational point. Shadowrun has a 90's full-blown metaplot that is revealed through dozens of supplements and dozens of novels, both for the Shadowrun line and the Earthdawn one. I'm not arguing that the basic book doesn't give you everything, it doesn't, not even close. However, there are reasons and explanations for many things that seem lacking, it's just spread out over thousands of pages.

Another totally rational problem is that FASA folded, and the people behind the metaplot are no longer in charge, and the metaplot arcs were not concluded.
 
There's taste, sure.

Saying you would need to go through and remove Creation and Teleport spells from Shadowrun where there aren't any at all, isn't taste.

It's not important that you like it, I don't give a fuck if you like it or not. But, if you're going to just spout stuff at random that's objectively wrong, you will be corrected.

But, Kudos for proving your hatred is actual Hatred, and it is totally irrational. :thumbsup:
Go read my posts. Find where I said that, then we can talk.
 
Alright. Let’s take a 3e street mage. Where did she learn mana bolt? Armor? Is she ex military? She’s a hermetic, so I would assume she looked in a book at some point. Who teaches a person that particular combination? Is it all self taught?
 
Yeah. Unfortunately, the original posts were permanently deleted instead of soft-deleted, so the only way to retrieve them would be to roll back to the backup from Thursday. That would mean losing everything else in the past two days.
 
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