Why is/was Shadowrun more popular than Cyberpunk?

[billd91]

Shadowrun had a bunch of adventures. While looking over the R. Talsorian Cyberpunk 2020 listings I don't see any. I know Atlas Games did a few for the cyberpunk system but Cyberpunk did not really seem to have stuff like Shadowrun's Harlequin or Universal Brotherhood or Dreamchipper that was ready to go if you tried out the new system.

Dream Pod 9 also had some: Dream Pod 9 on DriveThruRPG
(I bought some when they were still called Ianus Games)

Oh, and Tales from the Forlorn Hope on your link actually is a collection of adventures.
Interesting that the Corporate Wars volumes aren't on the DriveThruRPG list for R.Talsorian. They're basically adventures too.

 

[Voadam]

Shadowrun also set itself much further away on the timeline - 2050 - vs CP2013 (aka CP v1) being set in.... 2013. CP2020 (aka v2) was in 2020... and we know it was totally wrong.

But of note we now have also passed a couple big days in Shadowrun history, Awakening at the end of the Mayan calendar in 2011 that brings in the new age of magic, and Goblinization Day (April 30, 2021).

In the 2023 of the Shadowrun timeline the divergences to now are already pretty significant. Most don't get that far into the weeds of the lore but there is stuff like in 2018 one third of the U.S. was ceded to the Native American Nations after the Ghost Dance War.

 

[aramis erak]

I think it'd be hard to make the setting make sense without FTL, and the significance Spice has for it.

The FTL link isn't all that important; the prescience and the geriatric properties are; the setting already had FTL prior to the spice, at least as noted in the appendices of the volume I have.
The geriatric properties alone, coupled to its addictiveness, and you have the same element of hydraulic despotism; one could even make it a single planetary setting by just reducing scales due to that addiction -- once it starts keeping you youthful, stopping kills you, so it being a critter in some deep desert on Earth would work. The FTL is an excuse for mono-environment worlds and a longer scope.

Also note that the FTL angle isn't needed in setting - non-sentient computers are used in later volumes, and they were used prior to the Jihad. That the computers needed for Folding Space are prohibited is an over-exaggeration of risk, as shown in both later novels (both Frank's and Brian's) and in the prequels.

The FTL drive is a Holtzman field effect. Without a Navigator, it's limited to some short distance... IIRC 15 or 25 LY... I'd need to reread Heretics and/or Chapterhouse... while a navigator can go hundreds of LY. So, it's a case of the setting never needed it to be spice dependent, it was just a more obvious utility, making the whole thing more easily grasped.

 

[Thomas Shey]

The FTL link isn't all that important; the prescience and the geriatric properties are; the setting already had FTL prior to the spice, at least as noted in the appendices of the volume I have.

I was more noting the FTL was still necessary for the setting to make sense; but I do think the political end doesn't make that much sense without the significance of Spice to the Navigator's Guild and thus the modern FTL economy. You could probably recast it as important on an anti-senescent function, but that is not what is pulling the political train as-is.

The geriatric properties alone, coupled to its addictiveness, and you have the same element of hydraulic despotism; one could even make it a single planetary setting by just reducing scales due to that addiction -- once it starts keeping you youthful, stopping kills you, so it being a critter in some deep desert on Earth would work. The FTL is an excuse for mono-environment worlds and a longer scope.

Also note that the FTL angle isn't needed in setting - non-sentient computers are used in later volumes, and they were used prior to the Jihad. That the computers needed for Folding Space are prohibited is an over-exaggeration of risk, as shown in both later novels (both Frank's and Brian's) and in the prequels.

The FTL drive is a Holtzman field effect. Without a Navigator, it's limited to some short distance... IIRC 15 or 25 LY... I'd need to reread Heretics and/or Chapterhouse... while a navigator can go hundreds of LY. So, it's a case of the setting never needed it to be spice dependent, it was just a more obvious utility, making the whole thing more easily grasped.

I think we're having different discussions. At this point you seem to be discussing how a somewhat similar setting could be constructed without some elements, not how important they are for the setting at hand to me.

 

[MGibster]

Shadowrun had a bunch of adventures. While looking over the R. Talsorian Cyberpunk 2020 listings I don't see any. I know Atlas Games did a few for the cyberpunk system but Cyberpunk did not really seem to have stuff like Shadowrun's Harlequin or Universal Brotherhood or Dreamchipper that was ready to go if you tried out the new system.

They didn't publish many standalone adventures. Instead, they had sourcebooks that contained adventures.

Forlorn Hope: This is also the name of a bar heavily patronized by ex-soldiers and current mercs, the kind of places cyberpunks might hang out in to make contacts and find work. There are plenty of NPCs to interact with as well as a bunch of scenarios to run them through. (This product also had a positive portrayal of a trans woman which isn't bad for 1992.)

Edgerunners, Inc.: This sourcebook details a company called Streetemp the PCs can be a part of. On its surface, Streetemp is a temp agency that provides workers to other companies, but it's also has a series of mini-adventures, or jobs, the PCs can sign up for.

Land of the Free: This is one of Cyberpunks flagship adventures, more like a mini-campaign, and it's one of the most railroady scenarios I've ever had the displeasure to run. The PCs are on a job to take a token from New York to Night City on the west coast and requires the PCs to take a very, very specific route.

Firestorm: Stormfront: This is the first book detailing the 4th Corporate War. It's not horrible, but it's almost unusable in an established campaign because much of it takes place on the water or under it. And creating PCs who have expertise in water is not the standard operating procedure for most campaigns.

Firestorm: Shockwave: This is the second book going over the 4th Corporate War. It's not as bad as the first book insofar as it takes place on land where the majority of other campaigns take place, but it does suffer a bit from 90s metaplot as there are times when you sit back and watch all the NPCs do cool stuff.

Cyberpunk 2020: The main book did contain 10 little mini-adventures to help get things started.

 

[aramis erak]

I was more noting the FTL was still necessary for the setting to make sense; but I do think the political end doesn't make that much sense without the significance of Spice to the Navigator's Guild and thus the modern FTL economy. You could probably recast it as important on an anti-senescent function, but that is not what is pulling the political train as-is.



I think we're having different discussions. At this point you seem to be discussing how a somewhat similar setting could be constructed without some elements, not how important they are for the setting at hand to me.

If the message of a story can survive transition to another version without it, it shows it wasn't essential to the story.

 

[Thomas Shey]

If the message of a story can survive transition to another version without it, it shows it wasn't essential to the story.

You have a much narrower definition of what's essential to a story than I do.