| From: | Bull <chaos@*****.COM> |
|---|---|
| Subject: | Re: Target: UCAS |
| Date: | Sat, 27 Dec 1997 00:32:59 -0500 |
>John E Pederson wrote:
>
>Ehh. I still have .. really long talks, let's say, with other SR
>players about place-books in general (and the Boston part of T:U in
>particular -- 'swhere I live, that's all).
>
>T:U was far too general, but that was a result of the medium -- the book
>was, what, less than a hundred pages? But, maybe worse, it dealt too
>much with *current* events -- that is, 1990s event, not 2058. When it's
>not out and out wrong, it's an okay guide to where Boston is at now; I
>want to know (or at least hear soemone else's opinion on) what Boston
>will be like 60-odd years from now. No, I wouldn't expect it to change
>*that* much, but, uh, with the Awakening, the Stock Exchange moving in,
>and other current events, I expected at least some weirdly interesting
>hooks.. and instead, there was a poor rehash of the Ork Underground, a
>nice laugh about how bad Boston Harbor is, and not much else.
>
Hehe... Once again this shows that, in general, people don;t really like
Place Books.
Personally, I thought it was the best Place Book I've seen in a while...
(And no, this has nothing to do with my guest appearance... that was just
icing:)). When I first started running SR, I borrowed Steve Tinner's books
and read through them all over the course of a couple weeks. The place
book were, by far, the hardest of the books to read. They just weren't all
that interesting. Facts, maps, and places... EVen if I was trying to run
a game set in one of the countries, I probably wouldn;t use the place book,
unless there was something truly useful in them. Color is all the books
are good for, and you don;t need 180 pages for that, you need more or less
what T:U gave you.
Boston seemed to be more or less a simple re-hash of the typical SR City...
One Rich Section, one Barrens area, and downtown... Throw in some
pollution and one unique twist, and season to taste. I'd like to see more,
and something more unique from my cities, but at least T:U didn;t take a
huge sourcebook to do it. And the idea of Witchcraft being prevalent in
Boston, the polluted Harbor, the Stock Market, and the concept of Boston
being a Witchcraft mecca/Tourist attraction at least makes the area
playable, and gives it some Flavor...
Chicago was cool... I nice follow up on Bug City and it's about time we
found out what's what in Chi-Town... I was a little disappointed in how
they actually cleaned up Chicago... It seemed a cheap cop out, and REALLY
sudden... Though I have the feeling this is all simply a side effect of
fun stuff going on in Ares... FASA said Corp War, maybe this is part of
it? Damion Knight deciding he couldn;t afford to have his troops tied up
in Chicago and rushed the Cleanup... Also, the Ghoul Archetype (and
FINALLY explaining what causes Ghoulism) was great :]
Detroit was VERY cool, probably my favorite section of the book, mostly
because one of the things I love is the backstory, and this really brought
Damion Knight to the forefront of things, and shed more than a little light
on his background. Though there wasn;t a whiole lot of actual detail on
the city, it was still nice...
>Sigh! If only Kenson had done a RFC with T:U, not just Seattle 2!
>
RFC?
I'm pretty sure Steve K is a Boston native (Or at least is from the area),
and I think he wrote that section.
<shrug>
Bull
--
Bull, aka Steven Ratkovich, aka Rak, aka Chaos, aka a lot of others! :]
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