What's your favorite Shadowrun edition?

[langolas]

Tho, 1st edition (german version) was also pretty cool, because it was so badly written it was almost impossible to derive how the game is supposed to work. Ok, the english one was only marginally better, IIRC.

FASA had the knack for making WONDERFUL game worlds, rich, vibrant, realistic, places you would love to play, and then come up with these off the wall rule sets. It took me months to figure out the mechanics for Shadowrun. Every FASA game I have played I have had to have an expierenced player teach me, i never would have figured out Battletech or Earthdawn without them

Ahhh well. For a change of pace, not D20, I still like Earthdawn.

 

[Sinjucala]

1st edition by far. It was straight to the point but open enough in the details and mechanics to allow for creative interplay and fun.

 

[PJ-Mason]

3rd. I've only played 1st and 3rd though. Never played second. Haven't played 3rd edition yet, technically. Just own it. Got it on sale at the flgs.

Thats all about to change. After living here for a couple months, i ended up talking with the landlord downstairs for a while last week....and he is a gamer!!

He likes D&D (which i am getting sick of) and...Shadowrun! So we'll be starting up a Shadworun group in a week or two. Woot! How do like them apples!?

 

[Jeff Wilder]

SRIII is far superior, mechanically, to SR and SR2. (I agree about missing the "chatter" between 'runners in the older sourcebooks, though.)

I've played SR from the first printing of the first edition, back when a GM couldn't scare a PC with anything less than a Panther Assault Cannon. SR2 fixed a lot of problem. SRIII fixed many more. I ran an extremely successful and long-lived SR2/SRIII campaign.

My problem with SR is that it is very nearly impossible to play with people who don't know the -- extremely complex -- rules. With D20, learning the session-to-session rules is a matter of a few hours at most, and, regardless, somebody else at the table can tell you want to roll, and when. With SR, though, the interaction of attributes, skills, dice pools, weapons, spells ... it's hairy.

On the other hand, the modularization of the rules means that only mages and shamans need to know the magic rules, only the riggers need to know the vehicle rules, and so on. (Except, of course, for the GM, who has to know all of it.)

 

[Thanee]

What's so extremely complex about them? I find them no more complex than d20, to be honest. And pretty much everything works the same way, there. Skill + bonus dice + pool vs target number, count successes, determine result.

Bye
Thanee

 

[D.Reaver]

I voted for 3rd.

I have run and played all 3 editions and like some rules from the other first 2 over 3rd. I think they oversimplified some things and overcomplicated others. When I run, it's 3rd edition with house rules that mimic what I like from 1st and 2nd.

btw the only 2 websites I go to frequently are here and Dumpshock linked above. Although I lurk more than comment.

 

[Andrew D. Gable]

Well, there's always PbP gaming. Andrew just started a SR campaign here.

And there might be a room free still, since some people havn't really shown up...

And if he'd want to sign up, make a sammy or merc please. With Electronics skill, right, Thanee?

 

[dead]

I don't know which edition I played but we used to roll fist fulls of d6.

Which edition was that?

 

[Jeff Wilder]

What's so extremely complex about them? I find them no more complex than d20, to be honest.

Only because you're used to them. The learning curve of Shadowrun is much, much steeper than that of D20.

And pretty much everything works the same way, there. Skill + bonus dice + pool vs target number, count successes, determine result.

Well, you forgot, " ... defender allocates pool, rolls dice, counts successes, and subtracts from your result ... " In a firefight, a defender potentially does this against two different target numbers, with two different sets of dice, for dodging damage and then sucking up damage.

You also gloss over dice pools, which is ridiculous, when one of the most vital things to learn about Shadowrun is proper use of pools. If you forget your synergy bonuses to skills in D20, it's no big deal. If you misuse your dice pools in Shadowrun, you're dead.

Any claim that Shadowrun is no more complex than D20 is, well, a little foolish.

 

[kigmatzomat]

SR had great flavor, but gawd, it was a mechanical nightmare. I driving to get a Pizza when the merc opened up with his minigun and getting back before he was done rolling dice. The tiny dicepools were problematic.

SR2 wasn't bad, but the few skills you needed meant you capped out dang early, the same went with the overlapping cyber/bio. I had a troll that took multiple autocannon rounds and not only survived, but was able to run away! The excessively huge dicepools became problematic.

SR3 is just enough balance, IMO. It's not as Wu-Fu flashy as SR2 was, nor as gritty as SR, but it is moderately easy to get someone playing (no harder that White Wolf, IMO).

The books aren't as entertaining (I miss shadowland!) and I think there's a distinct lack of vision right now for the line. Same thing happened to CP2020 once the world was fully built, but that's more of a publishing problem than a gaming problem. It would be nice for Fan Pro to either put out some modules maybe as PDFs or act as a clearing house for them.