5 comments about Shadowrun Companion: Beyond the Shadows.

1. As with any game, you need details. this book in my opinion is a vital part of the shadowrun universe. While one could incorporate "Uncouth" or "College Education" into a charicter background, this provides yet another way for starting chars to beef themselves up. The descriptions are funny, and the artwork is good. If you buy this book, get the Riggers 2.0 ...I just love the Gremlins Flaw.



2. The Companion is the most useful sourcebook I own. It's full of new ideas and rules and a great point based character creation system. I felt that it clarified several things that SR2 left out. A must for the serious GM.



3. Beware: If you're looking for the 3rd Edition version of the Shadowrun Companion, this is not it!



4. ever wondered just how to 'entice' your players to do away with roleplaying? here it is. inside this book, you too can learn how to no longer have a 'runner who pays moms bills' but, instead have a 'dependendant' as a 2 point flaw, which allows you to purchase the aptitude edge for your Light Machine Gun, 2 point edge. also included is a revision of the old 'sum to ten' character generation, a bunch of world of darkness ripoffs, and yet more alternate camapign ideas, for those of you who skipped 'missions'. While some of the sections on, 'personality' and 'friend of a friend' contacts seem custom made ofr shadowrun, the vast majority of the book feels like an excuse to allow for deadlier characters at generation with the illusion of personality tacked over them. I would have much rather seen information from the old OOP Shadowbeat revised and included in this book instead.



5. This book although from second edition works nearly perfectly with third. This book goes over metahuman subtypes, shapeshifters, enemies, edges and flaws, and evan alternate campaighnes like Lone Star Doc Wagon and evan the military. This book is a must have but if you play the third edition make shure you get the third edition companion if it's available.

1 comments about State of the Art 2063 (Shadowrun) (Battletech).

1. I enjoyed this book, it added interesting social and rules twists for new magic techniques. The gene-tech was so-so, but did inspire a number of potential new Shadowrun plot hooks. The new military vehicles for mercenaries were much needed. The other sections were nice as well.
   
   If you're a Shadowrun fan who isn't entirely sold on 4th edition, you should get this book while it is available.

5 comments about Fields of Fire (Shadowrun, No. 7114).

1. I wouldn't want anything in this book pointed at my player character.

   Can we please do something a little more subtle than throwing Insect Spirit Queens, Force 20 Free Spirits, and Juggernauts at the PCs in direct combat? I know if I went up against a Juggernaut, I'd at least want a tank, and tanks are way beyond Shadowrun's game mechanic limits; the lesser (but not by much) weapons found in this book, although pretty cool, do not belong in either PC or Corporate hands. If a Corporation finds itself deploying this sort of stuff its bottom line would sink overnight.




2. Although the stuff in here may be a little to powerful every runner needs at least some action packed runs these things really help mercs and sams get some extra punch and the new rules are good. Just use whatever you like and ignore what you don't



3. When one of my players bought this book I thought that it would be a good thing but when I started to read it I was horrified at the way fasa took this book I thought that I was reading a Rifts book and that made me want to head for the hills and find shelter from the end of the world. I think that it was just a book for munchkins and I don't like the idea that shadowrun is moving to the more power less roleplaying end of the spectrum.



4. I just recently got this book and though it is a little out of date(about five years)but it is still a great book that has all the weapons, armor, vehicles, cyber and bioware etc. This book also contains a lot of helpful rules for being a full time Merc. Personally this is my favorite book mainly because it contains all of the gear and rules you could ever need. This book contains gear from SRII,Street Samurai Catolouge,and Cyber and Shadowtech.



5. Fields of Fire was originally the 2nd weapons expansion for Shadowrun. It was mostly the mercenary sourcebook and was 1/3 new stuff, 1/3 new rules, and 1/3 an essay on how to be a mercenary.

   As of Shadowrun 3rd edition and the Cannon Companion this book is really outdated. Some the weapons and stuff in it may not even be useable under 3rd edition rules without some conversion. However, it does have 2 strong suits that I think make it worth picking up if you're into Shadowrun.

   First of all, the part at the beginning about what it means to be a mercenary is pretty interesting and potentially very useful as far as role playing goes.

   Second, there are pictures of all the gear and vehicles in the book. While the Cannon Companion *does* have listing for all of the weapons in this book (I believe) it's always nice to be able to put a picture to the item.

   Be warned though that some of the stuff in this can unbalance your game as most of the weapons are military and very powerful. I'd reccomend keeping it hard for your runners to get ahold of this stuff and keep it very expensive. After all, military grade hardware should not be easy to come by on the street.

   It's middling easy to find and you can pick it up for a decent price.

5 comments about Corporate Download (Shadowrun) (Shadowrun).

1. Another excellent source for information on the Awakened World. A much needed update on the corporate struggles that plague the UCAS, CAS, and anywhere else that holds any value. Valuable info on new corps, such as Novatech. A good accessory to help sort out the chaos of the Fuchi collapse.



2. shadowrun is one of the best rpg made. this is my opinion but you you should definatly should get it.



3. this is a great book if you feel like running a game where the corps have a greater presence and intrical part in the story. also good for a history on the corps.



4. I liked the book overall, and found that a lot of background info was given to help anyone who cared learn about the big 10. The mega-corps are all very well-detailed, and some of the info has mucho potential as GM material and story hooks. However, I thought that the game info section with the rules could have been a bit better, such as maybe including general pay scale for certain types of shadowruns. But that's just me. Overall, the book rocked. Get it if the Big 10 interest you at all, and especially if you're a GM planning on some corporate espionage!



5. "CORPORATE DOWNLOAD focuses on the ten most important characters in the SHADOWRUN universe - the AAA megacorporations that dictate what happens in the shadows and the world at large. The year is 2061, and the dust is settling on a corporate war in which one of the mightiest megacorporations fell. In the aftershocks, three new megacorps rose to prominence, each taking a different path to the top and showing the other megas that they do not have the market cornered on deception and power."
   - from the Introduction
   
   Meant for use with:
   SHADOWRUN, 3rd edition and the revised SHADOWRUN COMPANION
   RIGGER 2
   VIRTUAL REALITIES 2.0
   CRITTERS
   MAGIC IN THE SHADOWS
   
   Plot-wise, CORPORATE DOWNLOAD describes the corporate world as it is after the death of Dunkelzahn (which indirectly triggered the corporate war) and after Deus' takeover of the Renraku Arcology in Seattle, so it is effectively a sequel to PORTFOLIO OF A DRAGON and to RENRAKU ARCOLOGY: SHUTDOWN.
   
   Typically of the best of the Shadowrun sourcebooks, this volume is organized as an electronic document from Shadowland, the (fictional) central clearinghouse for shadowrunner information in the Shadowrun world. As in the real world, of course, information is compiled by characters having their own agendas, which may include the spread of disinformation, so gamemasters are free to decide whether the truth is out there and what it is.
   
   Captain Chaos begins by turning over center stage to two shadowrunners who in parallel provide two quick and dirty tutorials about the facts of life. The Chromed Accountant in "Taking Care of Business" outlines the basic knowledge needed to understand the megacorps: the definitions of "corporation", "multinational corporation", and "megacorporation", and what the AAA rating system actually tells you about a megacorporation. Alongside this explanation of what the corps are lies Wobbly's "They Got the Whole World in Their Hands", which discusses the power of the megacorps: how it evolved and how they maintain it.
   
   The next section, before discussion of the individual megacorps begins, covers "The Corporate Court". The Big 10 megacorps - the 10 biggest multinationals, who between them control more resources than all the other corporations on Earth put together - comprise the Corporate Court, which not only settles inter-corporate disputes but determines a corporation's status in the A - AAA rating system; that is, the Corporate Court decides whether a corporation has extraterritoriality, whether it can act as a law unto itself.
   
   After a final bit of initial tutorial material, "Surviving the Corporations", each individual member of the Big 10 has its own chapter, ranked in alphabetical order. Several entries begin with a little corporate history lesson before moving on to discuss the corporation's internal organization (e.g. primary divisions or businesses) and the major power players, such as Lofwyr's inner circle in the case of Saeder-Krupp.
   
   All of the above is marked up with running commentary by Shadowland's shadowrunner visitors, expanding on areas of their own expertise and debunking items they disagree with. Lots of adventure seeds here, though no pre-packaged scenarios; shadowrunners often give examples. The main article on Yamatetsu, for instance, describes their corporate policy of no shadowruns not sanctioned by upper management, to prevent pointy-haired middle managers from messing up situations they don't understand. (The policy came about because a mid-level exec arranged for the murder of a Shiawase employee who'd been making trouble for Yamatetsu - who turned out to be a Yamatetsu deep-cover agent luring Shiawase into trusting him, unbeknownst to the middle-management Yamatetsu weenie who tried to take him out.) In real life, this means that runs arranged for a mid-level exec's personal gain involve dodging Yamatetsu's own security.
   
   Very good read.
   
   "Though AA corps have frequent dealings with the Corporate Court and accounts with the Zurich-Orbital Bank, they have no official presence on the Court proper. Despite their power, they remain as much at the Court's mercy as the smallest corps. Each and every one would kill their mothers to get on the Court."
   - the Chromed Accountant

No comments about State of the Art 2064 (Shadowrun).

1 comments about Shadowrun: Shadows of Asia (FPR25007) (Shadowrun).

1. Even though the "Shadows of..." books are now, in the game timeline, five years out of date, they still provide excellent background information for Shadowrunners to use to flesh out their characters.
   
   "Shadows of Asia" is a good resource for those 'runners coming from -- you guessed it -- Asia, providing the history of things to come for every major country in the Middle East, India, China, Japan, Russia, and southeast Asia. With so many different countries presented, though, certain sections seemed like they skimped a bit -- there's very little on some of the smaller nations like Vietnam, whereas the Japan section is huge. China's numerous small nations have individually little information presented for each, but on the whole, the China section is actually longer than it looks. Likewise, the section on the Middle East isn't very long. Russia is presented here and not in "Shadows of Europe," which is something to remember for those who want to run characters from the wrong side of the Iron Curtain.
   
   One disappointment of mine was the lack of information on Australia, New Zealand, and the Pacific Rim; no information at all is given about the ANZAC, its surrounding islands, or Hawaii.
   
   Overall though, it is worthwhile. It gives players a good idea of the Asian shadows as well as the usual assortment of redrawn maps in case your next run takes you to the PacRim. As usual, there are dozens of little hints and off-hand comments throughout to provide GMs with ideas for plot hooks and shadowruns.

5 comments about Street Samurai Catalog/Shadowrun 7104.

1. The street samurai catalog was full of weapons reviews. This helps a lot because now i can give my characters much better gear.



2. Honestly, I'm tired of supporting FASA by buying sourcebooks, but this one has a lot and I do mean A LOT of useful information that you should need for your campaign.



3. This book is written more from advertisers point of view, and seems to be a quite relistic catalog. The quotes are great and i like them, but i wanted more information. it gave general information, but not how everthing worked.



4. needed more items and weapons.It also could have contained GM tips and tricks.



5. A note: If you are playing Third Edition Shadowrun and don't feel like collecting old source material, skip this book completely (it is replaced by a newer sourcebook, as is its companion, Fields of Fire).

   That said: Unlike some of the later sourcebooks, most things here are actually useful while not being overpowered. In addition, it gives a better range of items to choose from within a class (for example, you're not limited to only 4 light pistols).

   If you are looking for more toys for your compaign, get this book. If you prefer a better idea of how to play a Street Samurai, don't look here. There's almost nothing on tips or hints in this book. Cybertechnology and Fields of Fire are much more useful for the hows and whys of playing street sams.

5 comments about The Forever Drug (Shadowrun, No 37).

1. This novel could have had a lot of potential, had its main character, Romulus, been treated with the sort of deftness and "alien" POV given to Striper or the various SR dragons. Instead, he spends half the novel behaving like a dog -- not even a wolf, but a DOG ... and a rather idiotic one, at that -- and the other half chasing an assortment of villains whose motives, and relationship to the "mystery woman" Jane, never seem very convincing. Shadowrun fans who are still obsessed with tracking down the odds and ends from Dunkelzahn's will can tie up a few more loose ends here, but for the rest of us, it's the same old "elves/dragons know something you don't know, nyah nyah!" nonsense that was already getting overripe when "House of the Sun" was published. Given that Lisa Smedman's done far better than this (e.g. "Blood Sport") for Shadowrun, "The Forever Drug" is a real let-down.



2. Not the best Shadowrun book written, but not too bad if you like the world's setting. Probably the most jarring problem with the book is that it appears some editor chose to do a global search & replace on the word "frag" and replace it with the word "frig". Readers familiar with the jargon of the Shadowrun world may find this more than a little irritating. (I know I did - it was like driving down a six lane expressway and finding a stop sign.)



3. I started out realy enjoying this book despite it being centred around yet another LoneStar Cop Romulus is a good character stuggeling to do the right thing evan though he over matched be just about everyone in the book. The Story moves you along Ok despite some obvious "why don't they just" On the whole until the ending its a good lite read not in the same league a any of Lisa Smedmans work but fun The real Problem I have with this book is ending it does not have one and unless this is the stangest lead to a sequal I have ever seen I cant imagine what happened.



4. To start off, I was wrong. I read the previous reader's reviews for this book before picking it up. I had a couple of Smedman's previous SR novels (The Lucifer Deck & Psychotrope), and found them enjoyable enough (if not great works of literature). My initial intention was to read the book, then point out it's good points - believing that Smedman probably was being unfairly/overly criticized for this one. But, having read the novel now, I must admit the previous reviewers were correct. This is a bad book, its substance overwhelmed by the writer's need to score political points unrelated to the storyline.

   "A reader from USA" is correct about the main character. To give credit where credit is due, Smedman was trying to capture the mindset of an "inhuman" character, and make it unlike the outlook of (meta)humanity. But this effort largely fails (I'm not sure Lisa Smedman has ever had a dog - her Cat Shamam in The Lucifer Deck is more plausably feline than her Canine Romulus).

   In addition to some minor, but highly distracting annoyances, the novel's ending is in my opinion weakened by two things: one, the introduction of a un-entertaining "terrorism" subplot involving an Amerindian takover of Prince Edward Island, which serves no apparant purpose to the plotline and is just an expression of her antipathies. The other is an appearance by the Great Dragon Lofwyr which I must say is the most inept, heavyhanded use of this re-occuring SR character that I've seen. I guess his role is to provide the nessissary backstory explaination that Smedman could not weave into the storyline because she spent too much time on the wholely unrelated P.E.I. sidestory/distraction - the ending could have been much stronger had she kept her idiosyncratic preferences in check. Note to Mike Mulvihill: next time please, please let Lisa set her novel somewhere in the NAN - she'll clearly be much happier that way, and thus the story will be more enjoyable for the readers as well. It's about time something get set in Ute or Sioux anyhow.




5. I enjoy reading about Shadowrun Novels that take place in cities other than Seattle (though Seattle is VERY exciting!). I felt the general idea of this novel is a good one and was captivated by it. I also was curious to see how a Wolf Shapeshifter could possibly be integrated into a structured organization like Lone Star.

   The main character had a lot of potential and so did some of the secondary characters (like Dass), and I was saddened at the end when the main character suffered the same 'memory loss' as the woman he was trying to help and was so loyal to. That was really good.

   Lofwyr showing up at the end actually DID seem plausible to me in the sense that what Mareth'riel and Romulus were involved in was very secretive and involved some VERY powerful individuals. And the tie-in to Tir Tarngire makes Lofwyr's involvement more plausable since he is a Prince of Tir Tairngire. Lisa Smedman did do a good job in conveying Romulus' loayalty to Mareth'riel - which added to the tragedy of the ending, for me at least.

   What the book lacked was a good flow in writing - the mechanics. It was comparable to riding in a lurching car with the driver learning how to drive stick-shift and failing miserably! Very distracting. There were many ways Lisa Smedman could have re-worded her sentences to make them flow better and incorporate the characters' discriptions, attitudes and perceptions into the flow of the book in a more effective and interesting manner.

   Also, the main character, Romulous, was WAY too tame. He was supposed to be a WOLF SHAPESHIFTER, not a German Shephard Shapeshifter! His situations and behavior were SO watered down, they simply weren't believable! I would figure that he would have had a MUCH harder time assimilating into (meta)human society to get to his current status as it is portrayed in this novel. Also, that Lone Star would have had to excercise more control over him to keep him in check.

   And, enough with the 'frig'! It's clearly frag. I kept trying to convince myself that it was an accent-thing for that partof the UCAS, but I didn't believe me. It came off like a typo, or like an editor who had tried to invent new Shadowrun jargon. In either case, it simply didn't work for me.

   By and large, despite the drawbacks of this novel, I liked it and I'd like to see a continuation with the main character because he has a lot of potential for further development, but these future books need to be written in a MUCH better fashion to do justice to the events and the characters.

1 comments about Underworld Sourcebook (Shadowrun).

1. In _Portfolio of a Dragon: Dunkelzahn's Secrets_, the great dragon Dunkelzahn was assassinated on the night of his inauguration as president of the UCAS. The murder shaped much of later Shadowrun history - in large part due to the Big D's will, the full text of which can be found in _Portfolio of a Dragon_.

   As with the other really great Shadowrun sourcebooks, this volume is organized as an electronic document from the fictional Shadowrun world, as posted at that spiritual home of shadowrunners everywhere: Shadowland. Captain Chaos (sysadmin extraordinaire) begins by pointing out the massive turmoil caused in the underworld by the sudden appearance of so much valuable stuff (and subsequent legal and illegal redistribution of wealth) - art forgery, for instance, got a big boost thanks to all the treasures turned loose by the Big D's will. Captain Chaos begins with the newly-murdered Mafia capo of Seattle and ensuing power struggles within the Finnegan Family of La Cosa Nostra. Of course, the Mafia in Shadowrun Seattle has to compete with the Yakuza, the Seoulpa Rings, and the Triads...

   The subsequent Shadowland chat takes the form of articles interspersed with commentary, primarily between X-Star (an ex-Lone Star employee from their orgcrime division) and the Chromed Accountant, between them making the point that in terms of money, most crime is organized crime. (A druggie might get a few bucks in a holdup, while a Seoulpa Ring decker could use the same store's computer system to divert a few million nuyen; the organization gets more bang for its buck.) And, of course, the Chromed Accountant helps explain financial aspects such as fencing and money laundering. (Most if not all fences will be affiliated with an organization, since they need information networks to find buyers and sellers; the same for fixers.)

   Each major organized crime entity receives its own analysis: the Mafia, the Yakuza, the Triads, the Seoulpa Rings, including organization charts, where each is dominant, and how their areas of influence have changed over time. The Seoulpa Rings are solely a Shadowrun phenomenon. (In the game universe, the Yakuza put aside some anti-Korean attitudes for the sake of expanding its territory and opportunities, and absorbed various Korean organized crime entities. In Seattle in the mid-21st century, however, one bigoted Yakuza chief so mishandled the various Korean leaders within his organization that eventually they were purged from the Yakuza for "disloyalty". The survivors split into lots of tiny groups with a classic cellular organization and went underground, and thus the Seoulpa Rings were born.)

   After the 4 major organized crime groups, there are lots of little pieces about various gangs, concluding with a section about various under*ground* - rather than under*world* organizations - policlubs, eco-terrorists, and rebel groups. (The final section advises the GM on how to run all of the above in a campaign.)

   Lots of ideas for GMs here, but no pre-packaged adventure scenarios. However, the commentary from Shadowland users scattered through the formal articles often gives examples of "yeah, that kind of thing happened to me" - e.g., somebody's friend (now deceased) ripped off the Yakuza and didn't bother to check who his fence was affiliated with, somebody else did freelance work for the Yakuza in exchange for a first-class cyberdeck (but are they *really* free of the obligation?). In one such story, the Yakuza began shaking down a small company, but when it was bought out by a bigger, tougher company, the bigger company hired shadowrunners to teach the offending crime group an object lesson, which appears to have worked - for now.

5 comments about New Seattle (Shadowrun).

1. nothi



2. This book gives a fairly good overview of the Seatle area, as it exists is 2060 - the setting of Shadowrun 3rd edition. I say overview, because this book does not contain standard format location descriptions like previous "place" books. Instead it has general neighborhood overviews. So it's not a replacement for old seatle - in reality it serves a totally different purpose. I give it the 3 stars it got because it's the only campaign setting currently available for shadowrun, so new GM's pretty much need it. However, if you can get your hands on old Seatle (via ebay perhaps) it's quite worth your while. Like all 3rd edition books, it lacks "black" comentary, so it lacks a lot in the flavor department. If your looking for flavor, find a used copy of Germany ;)



3. This book's real strength is the mixing of 1.) a quasi-objective look at the history, culture, and factions of 2060 Seattle with; 2.) The sporadic, often contrasting, and entirely subjective views of Seattle provided by the inhabitants of Her. The information is fairly well organized, and if I could pick just one thing I found irritating about the book, it would be the lack of maps. There are only about 4 maps in the book, which is not much considering that there are over 8 districts in Seattle. There are multiple references to specific streets, but the maps in the book don't show any of the streets beyond the major highways. However, this is a fairly minor point, as streets are easily enough made up. There true strength of this book lies not in geography but in the wealth of ideas it can provide for a game master.



4. This book gives you a lot of ideas for a campaign based in Seattle. I was dissapointed in the lack of maps, only "area" maps are included. The lack of detail on the maps hurts a GM who needs spontaneous location info, especially when the question is "What's nearby?". I'm not saying a huge amount of detail needed to be given, but location of extremely well known buildings would have been nice.

   That said, if you have the prior version of this book, the two together make a very complete setting. I would also advise acquiring a modern day map of Seattle. This will help you with terrain features and major roads. It will give you a good starting point anyway.

   If you are a GM running campaigns in other locations, I would still reccommend this. Much of the information can be easily transposed to any urban environment.

   I would give this 5 stars but for the maps.




5. As an avid Shadowrun gamer, I was ready and willing to pick up anything FASA (Sadly now now defunct. SR has gone to Wizkid games.) published with the cherrished snake-S logo. Like all the other SR books I've bought for the third edition, this one did not dissapoint. Unlike other previous books, this one did not include a map, but that was tolerable. In fact, it allows for the kind of creative leeway any good gamemaster appreciates. It has a list of adventure hooks that could easily lead to any number of campaigns with little trouble. And there are sections covering everything from Seattle's history to Policlubs, the various crime syndicates (Yakuza, Seoulpa, Mafia, Triad.) And all the subdivisions therin, along with some words on the hot spots of Seattle, the law enforcement, and everyone's favorite little ShadowLand comments. Definitely worth the buy. Though my book had a different cover than the one displayed... Mine had a hovercraft and a troll trying to jump on. Different edition?