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Message no. 1
From: JLantrip@******.COM JLantrip@******.COM
Subject: Source Vs. Rule
Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2000 08:20:58 -0700
>The point was... some people want a new and updated sourcebook covering
all
>of North America.
>Their 2 main points for why this should happen:
> -Almost all the books are out of print and expensive on eBay
> -Most of the info on North America is from 2050-2052, the current
> timeline is 2061-2062.

This is kinda veering away from what I've seen along this topic
(though I don't see what's wrong with suggesting someone get a map.
Although, there's a neat one in "New Seattle". I usually pick up a map for
whatever city I've gm'd in, even if I live[d] there...)...

I had asked this question to Shadowrun@****.com, but, well, they're
pretty busy people. Has anyone ever talked to the FASA group about
"digitizing" the old and OOP sourcebooks? Stuff that they aren't ever going
to reprint. Warner Doles talked to Brian/Randall about it for the old House
books for Battletech, and that seemed to fly pretty well. (Of course, with
B-tech...they've gotta remove all the "Unseen" most likely...but no such
problems in SR)
I know that a lot of the material from the older books is getting
updated in newer ones, but why let it all slide into "Out-of-Print Hell"?
I'd hate to see all of those older (source)books disappear (even if the
stats are in 1st/2d edition stuff...I can convert).

Anyone know the odds of getting FASA's approval for this?

--J
Message no. 2
From: Gurth gurth@******.nl
Subject: Source Vs. Rule
Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2000 19:23:56 +0100
According to JLantrip@******.COM, on Tue, 31 Oct 2000 the word on the street was...

> I had asked this question to Shadowrun@****.com, but, well, they're
> pretty busy people. Has anyone ever talked to the FASA group about
> "digitizing" the old and OOP sourcebooks? Stuff that they aren't ever going
> to reprint.

On the list, we've been having the occasional thread about this for at
least three or four years, and at GenCon '99 Mike Mulvihill was talking
about releasing the OOP adventures (updated to SR3) on the FASA web site.
Not much seems to have come from it, though, probably because of the tight
release schedule they're working under (IIRC, they're working on three
different books at a time these days). This sounds like I'm a
FASA-apologist, I know :)

FWIW, even though I myself have own a near-complete collection of SR books
(everything except the FASA version of Into The Shadows and Matrix), I'd
like to see them go through with this. I have sort of given up hope on it,
though :(

> I know that a lot of the material from the older books is getting
> updated in newer ones, but why let it all slide into "Out-of-Print Hell"?
> I'd hate to see all of those older (source)books disappear (even if the
> stats are in 1st/2d edition stuff...I can convert).
>
> Anyone know the odds of getting FASA's approval for this?

For doing it ourselves? Slim to non-existant, I would guess. In the
past, various listmembers have offered to help FASA with things like their
web site, and their offers have always been declined.

--
Gurth@******.nl - http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/index.html
The less of a life, the more mail you read.
-> NAGEE Editor * ShadowRN GridSec * Triangle Virtuoso <-
-> The Plastic Warriors Page: http://plastic.dumpshock.com <-

GC3.1: GAT/! d-(dpu) s:- !a>? C+@ UL P L+ E? W(++) N o? K- w+ O V? PS+
PE Y PGP- t(+) 5++ X+ R+++>$ tv+(++) b++@ DI? D+ G(++) e h! !r(---) y?
Incubated into the First Church of the Sqooshy Ball, 21-05-1998
Message no. 3
From: Adam J adamj@*********.com
Subject: Source Vs. Rule
Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2000 12:38:15 -0600
At 14:24 31/10/2000 -0500, Lute, David wrote:

> I have always wanted a gaming company to provide all their source
>material on line for a price. Heck I would be willing to pay for a yearly
>subscription of even a book by book payment that was a bit cheaper to
>download it and print it out myself. But alas not a single one even thinks
>of doing it this way.

Sure, some do. They're just generally smaller companies that can't afford
to publish conventionally (The RPG business is not one where you can quit
your day job...) and can afford to "think outside the box".

One such company would be MicroTactix, which publishes SIMPLY ROLEPLAYING,
a generic set of RPG rules, COMPACT COMBAT and BUDGET BATTLEFIELD, rules
for man to man and mass battle combat (All three sets are nice and
compatible), plus a line of CARDSTOCK CREATIONS, which are 25mm building
kids - print 'em out on cardstock, fold them real nice, and you have cheap
terrain.

MT aren't the only guys doing it, either. Look around, you might be
pleasantly surprised.

Adam
--
< The Shadowrun Supplemental? ShadowFAQ? Full Count? >
< Latest news about them all: http://staff.dumpshock.com/adamj/ >
< adamj@*********.com | ICQ# 2350330 | TSS Productions >
Message no. 4
From: Phil Smith phil_urbanhell@*******.com
Subject: Source Vs. Rule
Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2000 19:16:05 GMT
>From: JLantrip@******.COM
> I know that a lot of the material from the older books is getting
>updated in newer ones, but why let it all slide into "Out-of-Print Hell"?
>I'd hate to see all of those older (source)books disappear (even if the
>stats are in 1st/2d edition stuff...I can convert).
>
> Anyone know the odds of getting FASA's approval for this?

Hell, we don't need FASA to do this, with FASA's blessing and a friendly
list member with a lot of books we could do it ourselves.

Phil

Dyingt is an art like everything else.
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Message no. 5
From: Lute, David dlute@********.com
Subject: Source Vs. Rule
Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2000 14:24:47 -0500
According to Gurth, on Tue, 31 Oct 2000 the word on the street
was...

> > I know that a lot of the material from the older books is
getting
> > updated in newer ones, but why let it all slide into
"Out-of-Print Hell"?
> > I'd hate to see all of those older (source)books disappear
(even if the
>> stats are in 1st/2d edition stuff...I can convert).
>>
>> Anyone know the odds of getting FASA's approval for this?

>For doing it ourselves? Slim to non-existant, I would guess. In
the
> past, various listmembers have offered to help FASA with things
like their
>web site, and their offers have always been declined.

> Instead of asking why not just submit the idea to them in a the normal
> submission process. It would save them allot of time in converting the
> stuff both to SR3 and getting it on the net. Then all they have to do is
> provide access to it for us poor sods who can't afford it.
>
I have always wanted a gaming company to provide all their source
material on line for a price. Heck I would be willing to pay for a yearly
subscription of even a book by book payment that was a bit cheaper to
download it and print it out myself. But alas not a single one even thinks
of doing it this way.

Just MHO

DL
Message no. 6
From: Jonathan Choy jjchoy@*********.net
Subject: Source Vs. Rule
Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2000 14:47:59 -0500
From: "Lute, David" <dlute@********.com>
To: <shadowrn@*********.com>
Sent: 31 October 2000 2:24 PM
Subject: RE: Source Vs. Rule


> I have always wanted a gaming company to provide all their source
> material on line for a price. Heck I would be willing to pay for a yearly
> subscription of even a book by book payment that was a bit cheaper to
> download it and print it out myself. But alas not a single one even
thinks
> of doing it this way.
>
> Just MHO

For a perspective on why this would suck for most game companies, look for
the paragraphs around "There is no spoon." in this article....

Of course, I think that any gamer who wants some perspective and hasn't
worked with a gaming company in a direct way before should read the whole
series. Love or hate his games, IMO John Wick does understand some important
things about story and characters....

http://www.gamingoutpost.com/vault/article.cfm/article.355/default.htm

Jon Choy
Tetsujin no Oni
Message no. 7
From: JLantrip@******.COM JLantrip@******.COM
Subject: Source Vs. Rule
Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2000 13:19:00 -0700
>For doing it ourselves? Slim to non-existant, I would guess. In the
>past, various listmembers have offered to help FASA with things like their
>web site, and their offers have always been declined.

Yeah, but FASA uses another company to do their web site/hosting. All
the B-tech list/board people (MFNA members, too) have all said something
about it in the past.

My point, though, which Adam answered early on was this: The old House
books for Battletech are being placed on the web, but by a group of fans
(well, and "insiders"). Why not do the same for "our" OOP material? I
don't
necessarily mean updating to SR3 stats or anything, but putting the books
on-line in .PDF format. By the fans, for the fans (to badly misquote
Interplay's slogan...). FASA (or a designated rep) would have to give it
the nod once we have compiled it, but, really, all we need is the
sourcebook, a scanner, Adobe Acrobat and some Free Time (tm).
If it were something like "in HTML format", sure, I could see the
problem, but in .PDF? It's just a resource then. And if they want to update
it to SR3 stats/standards, then they already have a product base to work
off of. Just change the stats and go.

I'm sure that there are enough people on this list that we could come
up with a few people FASA wouldn't mind being "in charge" of reviewing the
material after it's been scanned and set before passing it to FASA.

--J
Message no. 8
From: Gurth gurth@******.nl
Subject: Source Vs. Rule
Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2000 11:57:42 +0100
According to Lute, David, on Tue, 31 Oct 2000 the word on the street was...

> > Instead of asking why not just submit the idea to them in a the normal
> > submission process. It would save them allot of time in converting the
> > stuff both to SR3 and getting it on the net. Then all they have to do is
> > provide access to it for us poor sods who can't afford it.

From what I've seen, the normal submission process at (the SR department
of) FASA these days consists of Mike (and Rob) saying "This is what we want
to publish next, who wants to write for it?" to freelancers. IOW, products
are initiated by FASA, not by someone outside the company who has an idea
for a book they'd like to see written. Of course, you can contact them
about something you've got in mind, such as PDFing the old books, but that's
still basically the same as offering your help...

> I have always wanted a gaming company to provide all their source
> material on line for a price. Heck I would be willing to pay for a yearly
> subscription of even a book by book payment that was a bit cheaper to
> download it and print it out myself. But alas not a single one even thinks
> of doing it this way.

As has been said by several others, some companies do; one I haven't seen
mentioned is BTRC, who sell PDFs of some of their products on the Internet.

--
Gurth@******.nl - http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/index.html
The less of a life, the more mail you read.
-> NAGEE Editor * ShadowRN GridSec * Triangle Virtuoso <-
-> The Plastic Warriors Page: http://plastic.dumpshock.com <-

GC3.1: GAT/! d-(dpu) s:- !a>? C+@ UL P L+ E? W(++) N o? K- w+ O V? PS+
PE Y PGP- t(+) 5++ X+ R+++>$ tv+(++) b++@ DI? D+ G(++) e h! !r(---) y?
Incubated into the First Church of the Sqooshy Ball, 21-05-1998
Message no. 9
From: Gurth gurth@******.nl
Subject: Source Vs. Rule
Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2000 12:09:04 +0100
According to DemonPenta@***.com, on Wed, 01 Nov 2000 the word on the street was...

> > It's not that I
> > hate being here (I haven't unsubscribed) but it's certainly not as much
> > fun as it was before we grew up... :(
>
> Ain't everything?

Why do you think I mentioned sometimes wanting to be back in 1980 or 1992
again?

> Gurth, as I realized today...so long as we have memories, grownup
> life (or, close to it) will never be as fun as being a kid.:-)

However, that does not mean we should accept the decline of the list...

> However, a great strategy, that's also mentally healing and enormously
> helpful to everyone....Go, volunteer to work with little kids or
> something...or just go to your local park and watch the little kids.
> It's a Good Thing.:-)

I think that would only depress me further...

--
Gurth@******.nl - http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/index.html
The less of a life, the more mail you read.
-> NAGEE Editor * ShadowRN GridSec * Triangle Virtuoso <-
-> The Plastic Warriors Page: http://plastic.dumpshock.com <-

GC3.1: GAT/! d-(dpu) s:- !a>? C+@ UL P L+ E? W(++) N o? K- w+ O V? PS+
PE Y PGP- t(+) 5++ X+ R+++>$ tv+(++) b++@ DI? D+ G(++) e h! !r(---) y?
Incubated into the First Church of the Sqooshy Ball, 21-05-1998
Message no. 10
From: vocenoctum@****.com vocenoctum@****.com
Subject: Source Vs. Rule
Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2000 12:40:13 -0500
On Wed, 1 Nov 2000 11:57:42 +0100 Gurth <gurth@******.nl> writes:
> From what I've seen, the normal submission process at (the SR
> department
> of) FASA these days consists of Mike (and Rob) saying "This is what
> we want
> to publish next, who wants to write for it?" to freelancers. IOW,
> products
> are initiated by FASA, not by someone outside the company who has an
> idea
> for a book they'd like to see written. Of course, you can contact
> them
> about something you've got in mind, such as PDFing the old books,
> but that's
> still basically the same as offering your help...
>

Mike has also made calls for people to submit stuff before in general.
The SOTA topic has died down with very little true response (IMO), but
it's also the perfect places for just about ANYTHING you want to submit.
If it goes the way I hope it will (1 book, many topics) it can include
just about anything cool, and is the perfect place to get your name in
print.

products seem more to evolve from other products, rather than submissions
as much, but it can start anywhere. In point of truth though, FASA
probably recieves more over the top stuff than anything they could
actually use. (I mean, if IE's and Horror's are too far, you have to keep
that in mind in your submissions)

Vocenoctum
<http://members.xoom.com/vocenoctum>;

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