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Message no. 1
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Valeu John EMFA)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Sat Jun 16 04:35:01 2001
Hey, just a quick question.
Has there been any update on the Year of the Comet cycle?
I decided on a career path for my team and YotC would be the next story arc.
(First the election, then the Shutdown, then YotC)
Message no. 2
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Gurth)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Sat Jun 16 07:20:27 2001
According to Valeu John EMFA, on Sat, 16 Jun 2001 the word on the street was...

> Has there been any update on the Year of the Comet cycle?
> I decided on a career path for my team and YotC would be the next story arc.
> (First the election, then the Shutdown, then YotC)

What kind of update do you mean? I doubt you'll find many people willing
to talk about what's actually going to be in the book, except to others who
signed a FanPro non-disclosure agreement ("I could tell you, but I'd have
to kill you" ;)

OTOH if you want to know if a definite release date has been set, I guess
the answer is "this year's GenCon" because I haven't heard any other date
being mentioned.

--
Gurth@******.nl - http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/index.html
Conformity is our tragedy
-> NAGEE Editor * ShadowRN GridSec * Triangle Virtuoso <-
-> The Plastic Warriors Page: http://plastic.dumpshock.com <-

GC3.12: 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: shadowrn@*********.com (Valeu John EMFA)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Sat Jun 16 07:55:00 2001
According to Valeu John EMFA, on Sat, 16 Jun 2001 the word on the street
was...

>> Has there been any update on the Year of the Comet cycle?
>> I decided on a career path for my team and YotC would be the next story
arc.
>> (First the election, then the Shutdown, then YotC)

>What kind of update do you mean? I doubt you'll find many people willing
>to talk about what's actually going to be in the book, except to others who
>signed a FanPro non-disclosure agreement ("I could tell you, but I'd have
>to kill you" ;)

Maybe just a general idea on what the frag's going to be in it, plus a
relase date.

>OTOH if you want to know if a definite release date has been set, I guess
>the answer is "this year's GenCon" because I haven't heard any other date
>being mentioned.

Well, that answers my second question..
Message no. 4
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Patrick Goodman)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Sat Jun 16 09:20:01 2001
> >What kind of update do you mean?
>
> Maybe just a general idea on what the frag's going to be in it, plus a
> relase date.

Shooting for a mid-July release; it's been through proofing by the authors,
and should be in art getting ready to go to the printers.

As for what it's about, Adam posted this copy of the back cover blurb on the
Deep Resonance Forums the other day:

The Sky is Falling!

The year 2061 marks the return of Halley’s Comet and the 50th anniversary of
the Awakening--do you celebrate or run for cover? Each day brings a new
surprise. Will you transform into a genetic changeling or fall prey to a
doomsday cult? Will you be in Denver when the dragon runs amok or in Japan
when the Ring of Fire deals death to the Empire? Will you fight toxic
spirits in the Yucatán or run from the walking dead?

Year of the Comet shakes and stirs the world of Shadowrun, describing a
series of events around which gamemasters and players can build entire
adventures and campaigns. It details a new dragon, new spirits, and new
genetic expressions that can affect your character. Year of the Comet is
intended for gamemasters and players of all experience levels. For use with
Shadowrun, Third Edition.

Enjoy.

Patrick
Message no. 5
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Patrick Goodman)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Sat Jun 16 09:30:06 2001
From: Patrick Goodman
Sent: Saturday, June 16, 2001 8:22 AM

> As for what it's about, Adam posted this copy of the back cover
> blurb on the Deep Resonance Forums the other day:

Dumpshock, moron, Dumpshock!!

That's it, back to bed with me...I shouldn't be on this thing this early in
the morning....
Message no. 6
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Sebastian Wiers)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Sat Jun 16 11:20:06 2001
>Hey, just a quick question.
>Has there been any update on the Year of the Comet cycle?

Are the development cycles normally tracked anywhere? Not AFAIK, although I
think that may be in the works for the Fanpro english language Shadowrun
website.

>I decided on a career path for my team and YotC would be the next story
arc.
>(First the election, then the Shutdown, then YotC)

It should be released at Gencon, and may even be shipped to stores by then.

-Mongoose
Message no. 7
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Valeu John EMFA)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Sat Jun 16 11:20:17 2001
From: Patrick Goodman
Sent: Saturday, June 16, 2001 8:22 AM

>> As for what it's about, Adam posted this copy of the back cover
>> blurb on the Deep Resonance Forums the other day:

>Dumpshock, moron, Dumpshock!!

>That's it, back to bed with me...I shouldn't be on this thing this early in
>the morning....

You do remember that I'm the guy without web access, right?
Message no. 8
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Patrick Goodman)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Sat Jun 16 11:45:01 2001
From: Valeu John EMFA
Sent: Saturday, June 16, 2001 7:28 PM

> You do remember that I'm the guy without web access, right?

Thus the inclusion of the cover blurb in the initial message, John.
Message no. 9
From: shadowrn@*********.com (BD)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Sat Jun 16 12:40:01 2001
> Shooting for a mid-July release; it's been through proofing by the
> authors, and should be in art getting ready to go to the printers.

Yay!

> As for what it's about, Adam posted this copy of the back cover blurb on
> the Deep Resonance Forums the other day:
>
> The Sky is Falling!
>
> The year 2061 marks the return of Halley’s Comet and the 50th anniversary
> of
> the Awakening--do you celebrate or run for cover? Each day brings a new
> surprise. Will you transform into a genetic changeling or fall prey to a
> doomsday cult? Will you be in Denver when the dragon runs amok or in
> Japan
> when the Ring of Fire deals death to the Empire? Will you fight toxic
> spirits in the Yucatán or run from the walking dead?

Uh, I'll take Door Number Seven: "Will you hide in your bomb shelter,
shivering like a Siberian nudist?"

I can't WAIT for this product. Gotta make space on the ol' shelves...

====-Boondocker

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Message no. 10
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Gurth)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Sat Jun 16 13:30:21 2001
According to Valeu John EMFA, on Sat, 16 Jun 2001 the word on the street
was...

> Maybe just a general idea on what the frag's going to be in it, plus a
> relase date.

For the reasons I already mentioned, this is going to be a bit
problematic... The back cover blurb Patrick posted gives a good idea,
though.

--
Gurth@******.nl - http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/index.html
Conformity is our tragedy
-> NAGEE Editor * ShadowRN GridSec * Triangle Virtuoso <-
-> The Plastic Warriors Page: http://plastic.dumpshock.com <-

GC3.12: 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. 11
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Gurth)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Sun Jul 29 13:15:04 2001
According to Steadfast, on Sun, 29 Jul 2001 the word on the street was...

> Of cuase, the netherlands will get it a wee bit earlier.

I don't care about _this_ country with regards to SR books :) I'm wondering
whether the UK will get them before the US does (as that's where I get
about 95% of my RPG stuff).

> Annyhow, reading that You've had a beforehand look on it (Grummel), You
> sure can wait it a bit longer than the rest of us :)

Yeah, but the actual book will look a lot better than the 141 home-printed
pages I've got now :)

> I'll post some things lster this eve (got to go to run a D&D Campaign in a
> few mins), but does that mean YOTC was nearly ready for some time now?

It means the authors, and I suppose some others, have had a software copy
for a few months now. This is mainly to allow things like last-minute
corrections; after that it still takes time to get the actual book ready for
printing, which means that only now is it actually available to everyone.

> Allways thought so, I'll guess that the main textbodies should have been
> done already, given the fact that this book should have aired about 2 Years
> in the past.

You know the story: FASA's closing delayed everything...

--
Gurth@******.nl - http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/index.html
Tot straks en poppelepee maar weer.
-> NAGEE Editor * ShadowRN GridSec * Triangle Virtuoso <-
-> The Plastic Warriors Page: http://plastic.dumpshock.com <-

GC3.12: 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. 12
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Steadfast)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Sun Jul 29 14:05:01 2001
And thus spoketh Gurth on the day 29 Jul 2001 a.d. regarding Re: YOTC :

> > Of cuase, the netherlands will get it a wee bit earlier.

> I don't care about _this_ country with regards to SR books :) I'm
wondering
> whether the UK will get them before the US does (as that's where I get
> about 95% of my RPG stuff).

Well. they should. Personaly I do not know, but maybe as us germans do seem
to get the stuff faster, maybe You'll switch to german deliverance. You
could have the Book on latest tuesday. On the other hand, nothing beats
loyality to Your RPG shop.

> > Annyhow, reading that You've had a beforehand look on it (Grummel), You
> > sure can wait it a bit longer than the rest of us :)

> Yeah, but the actual book will look a lot better than the 141 home-printed
> pages I've got now :)

Definatly true, the Art is nice and I do hope FanPro will keep the old
Artists (though I do not like everyone, but thats personal taste). Printing
Quality seesm the same standard to me, as the foramt of the book, so no
sweat over there.

> > I'll post some things lster this eve (got to go to run a D&D Campaign in
a
> > few mins), but does that mean YOTC was nearly ready for some time now?

> It means the authors, and I suppose some others, have had a software copy
> for a few months now. This is mainly to allow things like last-minute
> corrections; after that it still takes time to get the actual book ready
for
> printing, which means that only now is it actually available to everyone.

After some considering one asks oneself, why one did'nt figured this logical
concept out by oneself :)

> > Allways thought so, I'll guess that the main textbodies should have been
> > done already, given the fact that this book should have aired about 2
Years
> > in the past.

> You know the story: FASA's closing delayed everything...

Sure, sadly so. It was simply lack of proper english language usage, as I
meant not 'should have been' but 'that the book was nearly ready before it
now at last came out. No bad feelings bout the delay, only that FASA is out
now saddened me.
On the other hand, FanPro should have quite an upstard with this book, as it
is after Target Matrix the first book that realy gives new and exiting game
Plots and brings the overall story arc way fast forward in my opinion. But
everyone should decide for one self.

I think every player group will find something for theyere liking, so I am
ver pleased overall.

-----------------------------------------------------------
Proud opwner of German Baby no. 89
**
Killing is my buisiness, and business is good.
atm....
**
Message no. 13
From: shadowrn@*********.com (shadowrn@*********.com)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Sun Jul 29 19:50:00 2001
On Sun, 29 Jul 2001, Gurth wrote:

> > Of cuase, the netherlands will get it a wee bit earlier.
>
> I don't care about _this_ country with regards to SR books :) I'm wondering
> whether the UK will get them before the US does (as that's where I get
> about 95% of my RPG stuff).
>

ahh....www.leisuregames.com they get it all, they get it quickly, and they
Know What They Are Talking About. truly a blessing since my local good
games shop has gone the way of the dodo... Do you get thier mailing list
Gurth? cos they didnt mention it in thier last mailing, but the new
releases are due tuesday/wednesday....

Heres hoping! (and ending the blatant plug. no, I dont work for them, i'm
just a satisfied customer :-)



John

--
jconstable@*****.com
-Do you think you can really scare me with your puny little....hum....
you've got another weapon....- Ikarus7
Message no. 14
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Bull)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Sun Jul 29 20:10:01 2001
At 08:15 PM 7/29/01 +0200, you wrote:
>Definatly true, the Art is nice and I do hope FanPro will keep the old
>Artists (though I do not like everyone, but thats personal taste). Printing
>Quality seesm the same standard to me, as the foramt of the book, so no
>sweat over there.

Rob used almost all the old FASA staff and freelancers to finish this book
(All working as freelancers). That could change a bit in the future once
Rob starts working on the books more fully (YotC and the next several books
were all in various stages of completion when FASA went under) and gets
some people actually working "full time" at Fan Pro LLC (The US division).
Message no. 15
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Gurth)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Mon Jul 30 05:30:01 2001
According to John@*****.co.uk, on Mon, 30 Jul 2001 the word on the street
was...

> ahh....www.leisuregames.com they get it all, they get it quickly, and they
> Know What They Are Talking About. truly a blessing since my local good
> games shop has gone the way of the dodo...

Or if you don't have a local game store at all.

> Do you get thier mailing list Gurth? cos they didnt mention it in thier
> last mailing, but the new releases are due tuesday/wednesday....

Yes, though lately about half of the new RPG releases on it seem to be D20
System stuff.

> Heres hoping! (and ending the blatant plug. no, I dont work for them, i'm
> just a satisfied customer :-)

Same here :)

--
Gurth@******.nl - http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/index.html
Tot straks en poppelepee maar weer.
-> NAGEE Editor * ShadowRN GridSec * Triangle Virtuoso <-
-> The Plastic Warriors Page: http://plastic.dumpshock.com <-

GC3.12: 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. 16
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Gurth)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Mon Jul 30 05:30:05 2001
According to Steadfast, on Sun, 29 Jul 2001 the word on the street was...

> Well. they should. Personaly I do not know, but maybe as us germans do seem
> to get the stuff faster, maybe You'll switch to german deliverance. You
> could have the Book on latest tuesday.

But would require me to find a German game store that has the things I'm
ointerested in, and does reliable mail order. Leisure Games has (almost)
everything as well as about the best mail order service I've ever seen.
Sorry, unless I happen to be in Berlin, I won't become a customer at your
store :)

> > It means the authors, and I suppose some others, have had a software copy
> > for a few months now. This is mainly to allow things like last-minute
> > corrections; after that it still takes time to get the actual book ready for
> > printing, which means that only now is it actually available to everyone.
>
> After some considering one asks oneself, why one did'nt figured this logical
> concept out by oneself :)

It's not difficult, no ;)

> > You know the story: FASA's closing delayed everything...
>
> Sure, sadly so. It was simply lack of proper english language usage, as I
> meant not 'should have been' but 'that the book was nearly ready before it
> now at last came out.

Like Bull said, the basic writing was pretty much done by September last
year as far as I can tell (first drafts, anyway) so if it hadn't been for
FASA's sudden decision to stop, it would probably have been out almost six
months ago.

> I think every player group will find something for theyere liking, so I am
> ver pleased overall.

I'll second that.

--
Gurth@******.nl - http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/index.html
Tot straks en poppelepee maar weer.
-> NAGEE Editor * ShadowRN GridSec * Triangle Virtuoso <-
-> The Plastic Warriors Page: http://plastic.dumpshock.com <-

GC3.12: 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. 17
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Arclight)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Mon Jul 30 09:35:01 2001
At 11:25 30.07.2001 +0200, Gurth wrote:

<snip>

>But would require me to find a German game store that has the things I'm
>ointerested in, and does reliable mail order. Leisure Games has (almost)
>everything as well as about the best mail order service I've ever seen.
>Sorry, unless I happen to be in Berlin, I won't become a customer at your
>store :)

You could order them at Fanpro's Onlineshop... www.f-shop.de or somtthing
like that. Quite fast...

Arclight
Message no. 18
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Achille Autran)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Mon Jul 30 18:10:01 2001
>Date: Mon, 30 Jul 2001 15:44:01 +0200
>From: Arclight <arclight@*********.de>
>You could order them at Fanpro's Onlineshop... www.f-shop.de or somtthing
>like that. Quite fast...

On the subject of distribution and shipping... Could someone give me the
coordinates of whoever is handling distribution of FanPro's books to the
shops in Germany? Around here (France, that's not too far away) shopkeepers
are rather clueless about the new distributors and just expect the book to
show up in their "new books" weekly shipment.

BTW, does anyone know wether reprints of the core books in english will be
also printed in Germany, or solely in the US? That may be of interest,
wether distributors here would get the books either from that side or the
other of the big pond.

Myself I ordered YotC direclty from F-Shop, I'll let people know if
international shipping if OK... It was weird however to roam a website in
German - last time I used that language was in secondary school, and it
wasn't brillant. Babelfish requests, well, adaptative understanding. ;-)

Molloy
Message no. 19
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Damion Milliken)
Subject: YotC
Date: Mon Aug 13 00:20:01 2001
Hi!

I just got my copy of YotC today (I'm in Australia, BTW ;-)). So far, the
art looks great!

--
Damion Milliken University of Wollongong
Unofficial Shadowrun Guru E-mail: dam01@***.edu.au
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Message no. 20
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Patrick Goodman)
Subject: YotC
Date: Mon Aug 13 00:30:01 2001
From: Damion Milliken
Sent: Sunday, August 12, 2001 11:18 PM

> I just got my copy of YotC today (I'm in Australia, BTW ;-)). So far, the
> art looks great!

What do you think of the *text*, Damion...? :)
Message no. 21
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Damion Milliken)
Subject: YotC
Date: Mon Aug 13 01:15:13 2001
Patrick Goodman writes:

> > I just got my copy of YotC today (I'm in Australia, BTW ;-)). So far, the
> > art looks great!
>
> What do you think of the *text*, Damion...? :)

It looks like the same sort of quality of printing as in other SR books.
It's black, about 9 point font, and fairly closely spaced. The ink seems to
stick to the paper well, although in one or two places might have a slight
tendancy to smear a little... <grin>

Oh, you mean the actual /content/? :-)

When I said "just got", I really meant it. I've had 5 minutes of looking
over it while on the bus to uni. Pretty difficult to do much reading on an
inner city bus...

I'll post my comments later on once I've had a chance to actually read
things. Although, the next time I see my group, our resident ED freak is
going to borrow YotC and rifle through it with a fine toothed comb for ED
links. I may not get a chance to read it myself for a couple of weeks :-).

--
Damion Milliken University of Wollongong
Unofficial Shadowrun Guru E-mail: dam01@***.edu.au
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Message no. 22
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Patrick Goodman)
Subject: YotC
Date: Mon Aug 13 08:25:00 2001
From: Damion Milliken
Sent: Monday, August 13, 2001 12:11 AM

> Oh, you mean the actual /content/? :-)

::slaps Damion just to make sure it's been done::

> I'll post my comments later on once I've had a chance to actually read
> things. Although, the next time I see my group, our resident ED freak is
> going to borrow YotC and rifle through it with a fine toothed comb for ED
> links. I may not get a chance to read it myself for a couple of weeks :-).

Tell him to get his own....

Please be sure to let us know; some of us are genuinely curious as to how
it's received by the gaming audience at large.
Message no. 23
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Zebulin Magby)
Subject: YotC
Date: Mon Aug 13 11:45:01 2001
"Patrick Goodman" <pgoodman13@************.com> wrote:
>
> Please be sure to let us know; some of us are genuinely curious as to how
> it's received by the gaming audience at large.
>

Well, I've read up to the part with Ghostwalker, and so far it seems to be
pretty neat. The Surge stuff I am kind of leery of, but we'll see how that
works in-game. I'm just wondering: Who's Ghostwalker?

Zebulin


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Message no. 24
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Steven Ratkovich)
Subject: YotC
Date: Mon Aug 13 11:55:01 2001
>>> "Zebulin Magby" <zebulingod@*****.com> 08/13/01 10:42AM
>>>
"Patrick Goodman" <pgoodman13@************.com> wrote:
>
> Please be sure to let us know; some of us are genuinely curious as to how
> it's received by the gaming audience at large.
>

Well, I've read up to the part with Ghostwalker, and so far it seems to be
pretty neat. The Surge stuff I am kind of leery of, but we'll see how that
works in-game. I'm just wondering: Who's Ghostwalker?

Zebulin


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Message no. 25
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Demosthenes Three)
Subject: YotC
Date: Mon Aug 13 13:10:01 2001
> Please be sure to let us know; some of us are genuinely curious as to how
> it's received by the gaming audience at large.

I found the cover artwork to be eerily prophetic.
The "This is the end." placard was slightly ominous IMO. :-/

It was weird buying Shadowrun material that didn't have a FASA logo on it.

SURGE - Is IMO an utter load of useless crap.
If I want to play Warhammer Fantasy, I will. Chaos mutations are a little
extreme for my flavor of SR.
Granted, I haven't applied any SURGE to my players yet, but ti sure looks
like any magic user that's been around long enough to initiate a time or two
is going to be getting a third eye, or a second head, or what have you. Ick.
Talk about having your character concept drastically altered.

While I think the name "Ghostwalker" is dumb, the general storyline
surrounding him is good.

The Japan material is long overdue I still don't understand why a game with
its origins in the cyberpunk movement could wait all these years before
releasing information on Japan?
The changes made to Japan are again, a little extreme. A metahuman
emperor?!?!?
Maybe if there were more materials descibing how the country handles that
(as well as recovers from the Tidal Wave) I'd like it more.
I think it needs an adventure set to detail some of these things out.

Dever needed an update. This one is good, but a little far sweeping.

That's actually my main complaint with the book. It seems to completely
alter the SR universe!
I expected the book to make some dramatic changes, but more in the way Bug
City made dramatic changes.
Here's a city that's been screwed over. Here's how the world reacts, etc.
Instead, that entire planet has been DRASTICALLY changed! SURGE gives
magicians one more un-needed kick in the pants. There's a new Great Dragon
around. The Japanese have to suddenly deal with their racsim against
metahumans.

Maybe I'm getting old, but it feels like too much.
It feels like each of the authors wanted very badly to put a permanent mark
on the SR setting.
They did, and now it doesn't really feel so much like SR anymore.

Demosthenes Three
demosthenes_3@*****.com


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Message no. 26
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Steven Ratkovich)
Subject: YotC
Date: Mon Aug 13 13:40:01 2001
Heya D3, long time no see...

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>>> "Demosthenes Three" <demosthenes_3@*****.com> 08/13/01
12:10PM >>>
SURGE - Is IMO an utter load of useless crap.
<<<<

SURGE was a very mixed bag for the freelancers, TBH. Some liked it, some didn't, and a
lot were neutral, basically saying "Well, hopefully it won't suck."

I'm still neutral on it, TBH. Someone o the DSF boards drew a comparison to Total Recall
and the mutants from that which I kinda liked... Gives me a better perspective on
things... However, keep in mind that SURGE is still going to be VERY rare, even among
Shadowrunners (And, like Meta's and Awakened, there's a much higher ratio of Changelings
than in the "Real World")

>>>
If I want to play Warhammer Fantasy, I will. Chaos mutations are a little
extreme for my flavor of SR.
Granted, I haven't applied any SURGE to my players yet, but ti sure looks
like any magic user that's been around long enough to initiate a time or two
is going to be getting a third eye, or a second head, or what have you. Ick.
Talk about having your character concept drastically altered.
<<<<

Actually, I think you have it backwards. The modifiers add to your TN, not your roll.
The more "altered" you already are (Though metahumanity, Magic, Cyberware, etc),
the higher your TN to become a Changeling is (Unless, of course, you allow it at Char Gen
using the "edge/flaw" style creation method with SURGE). The one most likely to
become a Changeling, by the rules, is the total mundane with no cyber. And how often do
you get one of THOSE in a Shadowrun game... (I have, once, and the player got very
quickly frustrated).

>>>>
While I think the name "Ghostwalker" is dumb, the general storyline
surrounding him is good.
<<<<

I kinda like Ghostwalker as a name... But agreed, the overall Ghostwalker stuff was
excellent.

>>>>
The Japan material is long overdue I still don't understand why a game with
its origins in the cyberpunk movement could wait all these years before
releasing information on Japan?
<<<<

The problem was Japan, as it was initially written, was unusable. You couldn't be a
metahuman, and it was described as being so tightly controlled that even Shadowrunning
seemed nearly impossible. Japan needed shaken up badly to open it up as a playable area.
And I expect we'll see some more info on Japan itself in the future (I know Target: Ring
of Fire has been brought up as an idea a time or two).

>>>>
The changes made to Japan are again, a little extreme. A metahuman
emperor?!?!?
<<<<

Nope. He's just a kid, one with less rigid beliefs than his family had before him, due to
certain aspects of his upbringing. I'll need to reread this section again before I
comment too much on the specifics... I don't remember off hand what the final storyline
looked like.

>>>>
Maybe if there were more materials descibing how the country handles that
(as well as recovers from the Tidal Wave) I'd like it more.
I think it needs an adventure set to detail some of these things out.
<<<<

Agreed, and originally, there were going to be 3 adventure sets for 2001 from FASA, each
dealing with different aspects of YotC. Of course, that all changed, so I don't know
what's gonna happen with those yet. I know Wake of the Comet deals with the Probe Race,
part deux... I don't know if Rob plans to do anymore with the YotC adventures or not...
I know he likes the Mob War style tracked adventures, and mentions he wants to do one,
but... <shrug>

>>>>
Dever needed an update. This one is good, but a little far sweeping.
<<<<

There was little point in doing anything with Denver without it being sweeping, IMO.
Denger was set up like a house of cards... you do anything with it and it comes crashing
down. The whole Ghostwalker bit helped shake things up, and it managed to keep Denver
pretty much in a similar situation it was in before... Other than Aztlan getting their
butts booted, and havinga new DragoN Overlord, very little actually changed in Denver, in
the end.

>>>>
That's actually my main complaint with the book. It seems to completely
alter the SR universe!
I expected the book to make some dramatic changes, but more in the way Bug
City made dramatic changes.
Here's a city that's been screwed over. Here's how the world reacts, etc.
Instead, that entire planet has been DRASTICALLY changed! SURGE gives
magicians one more un-needed kick in the pants. There's a new Great Dragon
around. The Japanese have to suddenly deal with their racsim against
metahumans.
<<<<

YotC is a LOT at once, I agree... But also, YotC was designed to be similar to the who
Election storyline, in that it's a jumping off point for future plots. There are dozens
of potential storylines that can evolve from the YotC events, easily, and probably dozens
more none of the freelancers have even thought of yet.

>>>>
Maybe I'm getting old, but it feels like too much.
It feels like each of the authors wanted very badly to put a permanent mark
on the SR setting.
<<<<

TBH, only 2 of the authors of YotC had anything to do with plotting the actual events,
myself and Steve Kenson. I know all I wrote for it was the critters, and AFAIK, Steve
didn't work on any of the major "world altering" stuff himself.

A lot of it was simply trying to introduce some new, fun stuff to Shadowrun, shake up the
status quo a little bit, resolve dangling storylines that have been hanging for a number
of years now (Yucatan),or in some cases, make certain places more interesting or more
"runnable".

Give it some time and a reread or two... Use what you like, don't use what you don't
like... Hopefully you'll stick with it... :]

Bull
Message no. 27
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Patrick Goodman)
Subject: YotC
Date: Mon Aug 13 14:20:01 2001
From: Zebulin Magby
Sent: Monday, August 13, 2001 10:42 AM

> Well, I've read up to the part with Ghostwalker, and so far it seems to be
> pretty neat.

Cool!

> I'm just wondering: Who's Ghostwalker?

Not to be too much of a smartass, but...Ghostwalker's Ghostwalker. He's an
interesting character to have running around, too.
Message no. 28
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Gurth)
Subject: YotC
Date: Mon Aug 13 14:30:15 2001
According to Demosthenes Three, on Mon, 13 Aug 2001 the word on the street
was...

> It feels like each of the authors wanted very badly to put a permanent mark
> on the SR setting.
> They did, and now it doesn't really feel so much like SR anymore.

The authors just wrote actual text to the outline supplied by FASA. Details
could be filled in, of course, but the major events were all described in a
document Mike M. sent out to the freelancers, who then chose the parts
they wanted to write about.

Want to know how big my "permanent mark" on the SR setting is? That you
have to banish a shedim twice to actually get rid of it. Major stuff,
there... :)

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Message no. 29
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Gurth)
Subject: YotC
Date: Mon Aug 13 14:30:17 2001
According to Zebulin Magby, on Mon, 13 Aug 2001 the word on the street was...

> I'm just wondering: Who's Ghostwalker?

If you were meant to know, you wouldn't be asking :P

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Message no. 30
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Drew Curtis)
Subject: YotC
Date: Mon Aug 13 14:55:01 2001
On Mon, 13 Aug 2001, Gurth wrote:

> Want to know how big my "permanent mark" on the SR setting is? That you
> have to banish a shedim twice to actually get rid of it. Major stuff,
> there... :)
>
Damn Gurth, you broke the whole game there. grin

Drew Curtis President DCR.NET (502)226-3376 (866)4DCRNET
Offering Quality Local Internet Access across Central Kentucky

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Message no. 31
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Zebulin Magby)
Subject: YotC
Date: Mon Aug 13 22:50:01 2001
"Demosthenes Three" <demosthenes_3@*****.com> wrote:
>
> It was weird buying Shadowrun material that didn't have a FASA logo on it.
>

This was the single biggest emotional factor in buying this book. In one
hand, I wanted it because it was Shadowrun...on the other, it doesn't say
FASA.........

]:

Zebulin


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Message no. 32
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Gurth)
Subject: YotC
Date: Tue Aug 14 06:40:08 2001
According to Drew Curtis, on Mon, 13 Aug 2001 the word on the street was...

> > Want to know how big my "permanent mark" on the SR setting is? That
you
> > have to banish a shedim twice to actually get rid of it. Major stuff,
> > there... :)
>
> Damn Gurth, you broke the whole game there. grin

Yeah, I know... I won't be using it in my own game, of course, in order to
keep things playable...

;)

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Message no. 33
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Gurth)
Subject: YotC
Date: Tue Aug 14 06:40:18 2001
According to Zebulin Magby, on Tue, 14 Aug 2001 the word on the street
was...

> This was the single biggest emotional factor in buying this book. In one
> hand, I wanted it because it was Shadowrun...on the other, it doesn't say
> FASA.........

I already prepared myself for this sort of thing a few years ago by buying
all five original German Shadowrun books. FanPro logos are nothing new :)
(But I have to admit it looked strange on YOTC when I saw a real copy of
that last Friday.)

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Tot straks en poppelepee maar weer.
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Message no. 34
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Ken Hart)
Subject: YotC
Date: Tue Aug 14 09:25:01 2001
Overall, YotC was pretty friggin' cool. There are lots of things to lead
up to as well as stuff to build from. I'm not crazy about SURGE, but I do
like the fact that it gives a mystical middle finger to everyone in the
Sixth World (including PCs) who thought they knew everything about magic
and how it works. And it enables PCs to experience the "Night of Rage" as
something other than decades-old history.

Who wrote the fiction "journal" that introduced the Shedim? That was really
creepy. Zombies have always given me the willies, and the fiction piece was
well written and chill-inducing. At first read, I thought the Shedim were
TOO tough, but after reading the GM material in the back, it looks like a
good balance.

Ghostwalker and the Yucatan War each open up a huge can of worms (wyrms?)
that will have ripple effects on SR politics for years. The sky's the limit
in terms of shadowrun activities: espionage, assassination, sabotage,
bodyguard, etc.

I haven't been interested in Japan to date for the reasons that Bull
mentioned: What COULD your typical shadowrunning team of PCs realistically
do? I'm still not all that interested in Japan runs, but it certainly does
make Japan more playable.

The Probe Race is my favorite part. Corporate espionage, secret agendas,
new technology, mysteries in space ... lots of potential fun for any campaign.

--Ken

Ken Hart / ghastrian@********.net
http://home.earthlink.net/~evilweb/
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Message no. 35
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Gurth)
Subject: YotC
Date: Tue Aug 14 13:30:01 2001
According to Ken Hart, on Tue, 14 Aug 2001 the word on the street was...

> Who wrote the fiction "journal" that introduced the Shedim? That was really
> creepy. Zombies have always given me the willies, and the fiction piece was
> well written and chill-inducing. At first read, I thought the Shedim were
> TOO tough, but after reading the GM material in the back, it looks like a
> good balance.

You have to remember that the main text about the shedim is mostly
preliminary stuff -- nobody knows much about them yet, so much of what's in
YOTC is the few solid facts available (mostly in the DMHS warning), and
plenty of speculation. The game rules are, of course, not as likely to
change :)

> Ghostwalker and the Yucatan War each open up a huge can of worms (wyrms?)
> that will have ripple effects on SR politics for years. The sky's the limit
> in terms of shadowrun activities: espionage, assassination, sabotage,
> bodyguard, etc.

Although the Yucatan is more a merc playground than a shadowrunner one.
Provided you've had your shots, that is :)

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Message no. 36
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Damion Milliken)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Fri Aug 17 12:00:02 2001
For those folks who are interested (Patrick ;-)), I've read a couple of the
chapters in YOTC, and can make comment.

I thought that the background was quite good. It really set the scene for
the "harbringer of change" nicely, I felt.

The probe race is a cool and fresh, new idea. It started off a little plain,
warmed up to be very interesting, but ended ultimately a little predicably.
At least it ended quite open, with many various possibilities for in game
use and later publications.

The SURGE chapter I thought was handled pretty well, considering. It most
certainly could have done without the prono star interview (who, exactly, is
the 14 year on the writers list?). And while it serves as a good enough way
to both increase racism (which is good) and show the unpredictability of
magic (also nice), I think that there were probably better ways to do both
of these. SURGE would have been a great critter specific trait, to make
critters more variable and nasty, but it's kinda lame on metahumans.
Limiting it to expressing only metahuman traits in metahumans would have
been better, I feel. ie, SURGEing and growing horns, or losing tusks, or
gaining astral perception, etc. A metahuman SURGEing and gaining animal
traits is a little tacky, I think. There was no need to go so far, as the
racism effect and the unpredictable magic effects would have both been
adequately handled if SURGE traits had at least stuck to their own species,
or thereabouts.

I'm currently reading the hysteria chapter, and will comment on it later.

What I really liked was the news reports. I thought that they were an
excellent way to convey information, and really broke up the bodies of text
nicely. They're extremely fun to read, and show a different perspective on
the SR world than we normally get from a very runner oriented Shadowland
data dump.

So far, in general, it looks good. Not great, perhaps, but not sucky either.
Certainly above average. Considering I've only read about 3 out of the last
6 SR publications, the mere fact that I'm reading it at all indicates that
it must be interesting :-).

--
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Unofficial Shadowrun Guru E-mail: dam01@***.edu.au
-----BEGIN GEEK CODE BLOCK-----
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V- PS+ PE- Y+ PGP-@>++ t+ 5 X+>+++ R++ !tv(--) b+ DI+++@ D G+
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Message no. 37
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Steven Ratkovich)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Fri Aug 17 12:15:02 2001
>>>>> Damion Milliken <dam01@***.edu.au> 08/17/01 10:58AM
>>>
For those folks who are interested (Patrick ;-)), I've read a couple of the
chapters in YOTC, and can make comment.
<<<<<
And me! :]

<grin>

>>>>>
The probe race is a cool and fresh, new idea. It started off a little plain,
warmed up to be very interesting, but ended ultimately a little predicably.
At least it ended quite open, with many various possibilities for in game
use and later publications.
<<<<<<

Definately. Wake of the Comet, the first adventure supplement FanPro will be publishing,
will deal with the second leg of the Probe Race.

>>>>>
The SURGE chapter I thought was handled pretty well, considering. It most
certainly could have done without the prono star interview (who, exactly, is
the 14 year on the writers list?).
<<<<<

SURGE was a mixed bag for a lot of people. <shrug> I'll avoid commenting on it for
now.

As for the Cat Furry Porn Star... Ugh. I know who wrote it, and he's going to be duly
slapped when I see him next (He's not a regular "onliner"). Rob apparently
really liked it too, so despite my lobbying to have it excised, it didn't happen :/

Bull


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Message no. 38
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Hekate Trismegista)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Fri Aug 17 18:40:05 2001
Steven Ratkovich wrote:
>
> As for the Cat Furry Porn Star... Ugh. I know who wrote it, and he's
> going to be duly slapped when I see him next (He's not a regular
"onliner").
> Rob apparently really liked it too, so despite my lobbying to have it
> excised, it didn't happen :/

I'm glad you didn't get it excised. I really liked that bit with the
porn star.

Shadowrun, for being a dark future, needs more influence from pop
culture. More influence from things like Howard Stern. :-)

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Message no. 39
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Achille Autran)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Fri Aug 17 23:05:13 2001
>Date: Sat, 18 Aug 2001 01:58:08 +1000 (EST)
>From: Damion Milliken <dam01@***.edu.au>
>
>What I really liked was the news reports. I thought that they were an
>excellent way to convey information, and really broke up the bodies of text
>nicely. They're extremely fun to read, and show a different perspective on
>the SR world than we normally get from a very runner oriented Shadowland
>data dump.

Ditto. That was a really good idea. More generaly, I really appreciated the
variety of point of view provided in the various Shadowland uploaded
documents, like KSAF live feed in Ghost Stories, or the Lieutenant letters
in Yucatan War, various news reports and so on. It really spices up the
text, makes it more enjoyable, and steers away from the "by runners from
runners" perspective that was IMO very dull and narrow. Info from the world
at large, and runners comments, that's a good formula for me, at least for
such storyline advancement. At least it's a WAY more hooking reading than
Target: Matrix or most other recent books.

As for the book, I like it, but I like most Shadowrun (source)books, so
let's say I like it more than most. Critic by chapters:

RETURN OF THE COMET:
Very good. A few mistakes in Kepler's astronomical data ("elliptic" instead
of "ecliptic", magnitude goes down when brightness increases) but that's
because I'm a nit-picker. The probe race is well written and contains good
adventure seeds, albeit the setting itself is slightly inconsistent: a
scientific space probe program takes time, MUCH time, and prospective
studies and simulations start many years before actual components are
assembled and sent out. So I find the idea of Ares anouncement and the rest
of the corporate flock following in a rush rather ludicrous. I can find
some reasons and twist events to be more sensible, but well, the book is
not. But I guess I can't expect too much from writers not familiar to the
field, and the abuse is far less obvious than say, with firearms.

SURGE:
I like the idea and the chapter itself. I dislike the rules. The first
gives an alien, unsettling feeling, and explains well the changeling hatred
and general bigotry upswing; the later unfortunately lean toward
spike-covered monkey ninjas, no matter how the writers tried to fix it.
IMO, proper (i.e., reflecting the actual condition depicted in the IC text)
game mechanics for SURGE would consistently lead characters to death or
unplayable crippling mutations. But it's just impossible to implement a
canon rule that would remove from the game PCs on a random roll. So we have
those half-assed mechanics. Well, house rules exist for that !
For Bull's comfort (or rather, hat discomfort): the critters are cool.
Really cool. I've got plenty of nasty ideas <egmg>.

HYSTERIA:
This chapter is somewhat duller than the rest. The Children of the Dragon
is a necessary introduction for the real fun coming later, but it's rather
bland. The other cults are, well, usable, but bring in nothing grand. Only
Ibn Eisa's story is strong, and introduces a world-shaking event in only a
thousand words. It also brings some light on the middle east, and that's
quite appreciable. I impatiently expect further developpements. Oh yeah,
and the news reports are really good there.

GHOST STORIES:
This one I'm really fond of. So what, I'm an ED-SR crossover fan, as well
as an avid material cross-correlater, so this chapter drove me crazy with
wild theories about Ghostwalker, his plans, Zebulon and so on. Moreover it
is very well written and conducted, the story dodges several gaping holes
and manages to make the take-over of Denver believable.

LIKE MANA FROM HEAVEN:
Two parts in this one. The orichalcum rush makes up for a good reading, but
remains fairly one-dimensionnal. I mean, no (more) devious (than usual)
agendas, no sociological evolution, no breathtaking events, it's just a big
plot hook. It doesn't sparkle grand adventure ideas in my mind.
Shedims are soooo nice. Great potential for them. *egmg*

RED SUNSET, RED SUNRISE:
Another one with sorely needed info on some part of the world that had
always been a great void. Unfortunately, we don't learn much about the
Japanese society, but that little is already savoury. I have a little
trouble to swallow that a fourteen year old emperor can shift the entire
society in almost a few days, but there's probably more to it. Maybe Ryumyo
in human form ?

CALIFORNIA UBER ALLES:
That one starts a bit dully, but ends in a shiny blaze, writing wise. All
that makes a big mess, and a period ripe with campaign possibilities. I
like it. And it emphasizes even more the prejudice in California, that's
something to the credit of the book: with that, the new Jihad, or the cult
of the Seventh Seal, the game includes controversial elements like religion
or casual racism, it adds to the grittiness and greyish nature of the shadows.

YUCATAN WAR:
I read this chapter last, but that's not because it's the worst. In fact I
like this chapter vey much. It's really well written and entertaining, even
if the action down there could hardly involve anything less than the most
hardened runners (other than being there when all things break lose). But I
would really like to plunge a group of players in the deep shit of
defoliated jungle, ultra-violent guerrilla, and corrupted magic. Things
would be even uglier than in Bug City.

AFTERSHOCK:
A hodge-podge chapter, this one is better than Hysteria. The three plots
are fine, but I guess that length constraints reduced the possibility of an
exciting presentation. Here we are in traditionnal "by runners for
runners". Nothing exceptionnal.

GAME INFORMATION:
Well, nothing much to add. SURGE rules have been discussed before, Shedim
rules are fine. The rest (mainly, how to involve runners in the events)
isn't very interesting, except for GMs not used to extract plots from
in-character pieces of fiction.

Finally, a word about art. There is relatively few, but fewer pieces than
ever are not very good, and none are ugly. Prescott is getting really good.
Except for his plate for SURGE where he succumbs again to that breast
obsession, all his pieces are great. The cover is good - in black and
white, on page 1! The colorisation looks a bit broken, and there is
definitely a big loss of contrast.

Overall, I really like this book. It's way better IMO than any tech book
(except MitS), and it makes the global storyline make a great leap forward,
with a good spin. It may need some work to be usable, since it deals most
with overall evolution and does not details the local backgrounds, but it
nicely accomplish what it was designed for: a whiplash to the world that
was sorely needed.

Molloy
Message no. 40
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Gurth)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Sat Aug 18 07:25:27 2001
According to Achille Autran, on Sat, 18 Aug 2001 the word on the street was...

> RETURN OF THE COMET:
> Very good. A few mistakes in Kepler's astronomical data ("elliptic" instead

> of "ecliptic", magnitude goes down when brightness increases) but that's
> because I'm a nit-picker.

And because you're writing an astrophysics/modeling/mathematics/stuff Ph. D.
thesis :) Anyone without such a background wouldn't have spotted these
little mistakes.

> YUCATAN WAR:
> I read this chapter last, but that's not because it's the worst. In fact I
> like this chapter vey much.

Great! :)

> It's really well written and entertaining, even if the action down
> there could hardly involve anything less than the most hardened runners
> (other than being there when all things break lose).

It's pretty much a mercenary setting, IMO; you could involve shadowrunners
on something like a retrieval mission, or pirates on a supply or evacuation
run, but neither has any real business staying there for any length of
time, I think.

> But I would really like to plunge a group of players in the deep shit of
> defoliated jungle, ultra-violent guerrilla, and corrupted magic. Things
> would be even uglier than in Bug City.

Anyone spot the historical references in this chapter?

--
Gurth@******.nl - http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/index.html
Tot straks en poppelepee maar weer.
-> NAGEE Editor * ShadowRN GridSec * Triangle Virtuoso <-
-> The Plastic Warriors Page: http://plastic.dumpshock.com <-

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Incubated into the First Church of the Sqooshy Ball, 21-05-1998
Message no. 41
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Achille Autran)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Sat Aug 18 10:10:01 2001
>From: Gurth <Gurth@******.nl>
>Date: Sat, 18 Aug 2001 13:00:51 +0200

>And because you're writing an astrophysics/modeling/mathematics/stuff Ph.> D.
>thesis :) Anyone without such a background wouldn't have spotted these
>little mistakes.

Not at all. That's high school stuff, for people curious enough, available
in any popularization astronomy book. It just stick out in the middle of
the rest of the astronomical data. My Ph. D. stuff is a LOT less palatable. ;-)

> > YUCATAN WAR:
> > I read this chapter last, but that's not because it's the worst. In fac>t I
> > like this chapter vey much.
>
>Great! :)

Heh. Congratulations then, Mr Westerbeke, if that's the one who wrote that
chapter who happens to be you. :-)

> > But I would really like to plunge a group of players in the deep shit o>f
> > defoliated jungle, ultra-violent guerrilla, and corrupted magic. Things>
> > would be even uglier than in Bug City.
>
>Anyone spot the historical references in this chapter?

You mean, about a war that involved massive bombings, agent orange and
napalm? Then yes, it was pretty obvious. Images from Apocalypse Now fit
very well... There are probably more subtle references, but I don't get
them. I'm not very familiar with military or Mexico history.

Molloy
Message no. 42
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Anders Swenson)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Sat Aug 18 12:55:01 2001
From: "Gurth" <Gurth@******.nl>


According to Achille Autran, on Sat, 18 Aug 2001 the word on the street
was...

> RETURN OF THE COMET:
> Very good. A few mistakes in Kepler's astronomical data ("elliptic"
instead
> of "ecliptic", magnitude goes down when brightness increases) but that's
> because I'm a nit-picker.

And because you're writing an astrophysics/modeling/mathematics/stuff Ph. D.
thesis :) Anyone without such a background wouldn't have spotted these
little mistakes.

I'm a million years out of college, I'm a social worker, and I did notice.
--Anders
Message no. 43
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Gurth)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Sat Aug 18 13:45:01 2001
According to Achille Autran, on Sat, 18 Aug 2001 the word on the street was...

> >Anyone spot the historical references in this chapter?
>
> You mean, about a war that involved massive bombings, agent orange and
> napalm? Then yes, it was pretty obvious. Images from Apocalypse Now fit
> very well...

Some might argue in this particular case, but IMO Apocalypse Now is a
movie, not history :)

--
Gurth@******.nl - http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/index.html
Tot straks en poppelepee maar weer.
-> NAGEE Editor * ShadowRN GridSec * Triangle Virtuoso <-
-> The Plastic Warriors Page: http://plastic.dumpshock.com <-

GC3.12: 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. 44
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Arclight)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Sun Aug 19 18:10:01 2001
At 19:35 18.08.2001 +0200, Gurth wrote:

<snip>

>Some might argue in this particular case, but IMO Apocalypse Now is a
>movie, not history :)

It sucks IMO. And I don't think that the upcoming directors cut will change
that. Especially the part in cambodia is sooo stupid. Wonder what they got
to smoke when they did it...

Arclight
Message no. 45
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Achille Autran)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Tue Aug 21 08:50:01 2001
>From: Gurth <Gurth@******.nl>
>Date: Sat, 18 Aug 2001 19:35:43 +0200
> > You mean, about a war that involved massive bombings, agent orange and
> > napalm? Then yes, it was pretty obvious. Images from Apocalypse Now fit>
> > very well...
>
>Some might argue in this particular case, but IMO Apocalypse Now is a
>movie, not history :)

I should have specified, "those particular images of a napalm bombing
during the "Walkyries Ride" sequence, and of the night guerrilla warfare at
the bridge sequence, that somehow fit my (hopefully very limited) personnal
experience, are rather evocative." The rest of the film is indeed
irrelevent, but from those two sequences one could build some nice
descriptions.

Molloy
Message no. 46
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Damion Milliken)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Wed Aug 22 12:15:03 2001
OK, I've read the next two chapters in YOTC, so here's my comments (for
Patrick... :-)).

I found the Hysteria chapter, even though it fitted in nicely with the comet
passing and all, to be little unoriginal and not very useful. Any half
experienced GM with a couple of spare hours and a brain storming session
could have come up with the half a dozen cults in this book, or at least
half a dozen cults just as good.

I did like, however, the Atlantean Rebirth, which I thought was a cool and
original cult - it's very believable, and could really go either way with
it's true purpose and intentions.

Also, the New Islamic Jihad has potential. Although, while its' a good idea
to give some much needed focus to the Middle East, it doesn't exactly provide
enough detail to be useful, and isn't exactly original. Although, hopefully,
there will be some followup in future products, which could make for a
really interesting running environment.

I actually quite liked Ghost Stories. The differing points of view from
which the information was presented were quite clever. Although I think the
takeover of Denver, or at least the physical/magical military battle
portions of it got far too close to "Ghostwalker is godlike, there is
nothing, zip, nada, jack snot and bugger all that you can do to stop him"
for my comfort, and began to lose credibility a little.

OTOH, I really liked the idea that a Great Dragon had set himself up as a
Sixth World nation-state. SR, with its strong fantasy ties, cannot really
avoid powerful Dragons. It's only right that a Dragon runs the worlds
biggest megacorp. And that one runs for UCAS president. But the problem I
see is that in most previous SR events, the dragons were rather behind the
scenes, manipulative, quiet buggers. Ghostwalker is an "in your face" hoop
kicking muther f*cker, which I think is a great dipolarism to existing SR
dragons that would rather hide behind the scenes and control things.

--
Damion Milliken University of Wollongong
Unofficial Shadowrun Guru E-mail: dam01@***.edu.au
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Message no. 47
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Patrick Goodman)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Sat Aug 25 12:45:01 2001
From: Damion Milliken
Sent: Friday, August 17, 2001 10:58 AM

> For those folks who are interested (Patrick ;-))....

I'd castigate you for taking your bloody time, but I've got no leg to stand
on at the moment....

> I thought that the background was quite good. It really set the scene for
> the "harbringer of change" nicely, I felt.

Glad you're liking it so far. Holler at me when you get to "Aftershocks."

> The SURGE chapter I thought was handled pretty well, considering.

I'm quite pleased with how it turned out, overall; there was a lot of dread
going into it, but the end result seems to have been pretty cool.
Message no. 48
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Patrick Goodman)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Sat Aug 25 12:45:05 2001
From: Hekate Trismegista
Sent: Friday, August 17, 2001 5:40 PM

> > As for the Cat Furry Porn Star... Ugh. I know who wrote it,
> > and he's going to be duly slapped when I see him next (He's not
> > a regular "onliner"). Rob apparently really liked it too, so
> > despite my lobbying to have it excised, it didn't happen :/
>
> I'm glad you didn't get it excised. I really liked that bit with the
> porn star.

Oh, God, please!! It was the worst sort of puerile pandering I could
imagine, and not at all appropriate. This is a game that's marketed to
kids, and while I have no problem with adult themes in my games, the fact is
that something like that had no business in a general audience supplement.
You want porn stars and cyberbrothels and crap like that, make it a
clearly-labeled "Mature Audience" supplement and try you best to keep it
away from kids.

> Shadowrun, for being a dark future, needs more influence from pop
> culture. More influence from things like Howard Stern. :-)

The only influence I want to see Howard Stern having on Shadowrun is for him
to go buy his own damn copy of the books. The man, and I use the term
loosely, is pond slime of the lowest order.
Message no. 49
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Bull)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Sat Aug 25 13:00:01 2001
At 11:42 AM 8/25/01 -0500, you wrote:
>Oh, God, please!! It was the worst sort of puerile pandering I could
>imagine, and not at all appropriate. This is a game that's marketed to
>kids, and while I have no problem with adult themes in my games, the fact is
>that something like that had no business in a general audience supplement.
>You want porn stars and cyberbrothels and crap like that, make it a
>clearly-labeled "Mature Audience" supplement and try you best to keep it
>away from kids.
>
> > Shadowrun, for being a dark future, needs more influence from pop
> > culture. More influence from things like Howard Stern. :-)
>
>The only influence I want to see Howard Stern having on Shadowrun is for him
>to go buy his own damn copy of the books. The man, and I use the term
>loosely, is pond slime of the lowest order.

Tell us how you REALLY feel, Patrick :]

<grin>

Bull
Message no. 50
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Martin Little)
Subject: YOTC
Date: Sat Aug 25 22:10:01 2001
> > I'm glad you didn't get it excised. I really liked that bit with the
> > porn star.
>
> Oh, God, please!! It was the worst sort of puerile pandering I could
> imagine, and not at all appropriate. This is a game that's marketed to
> kids, and while I have no problem with adult themes in my games, the fact is
> that something like that had no business in a general audience supplement.
> You want porn stars and cyberbrothels and crap like that, make it a
> clearly-labeled "Mature Audience" supplement and try you best to keep it
> away from kids.

Because the last thing you want when your kids are running around
pretending to steal and murder for the highest bidder is them running
into someone having sex for money ;)

Seriously though, it's a general fact that the Porn industry is almost
always the first to embrace new things and as such I found the snippet to
give the piece a little life.

Further Reading

If you enjoyed reading about YOTC, you may also be interested in:

Disclaimer

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Thwap!