As I'm replaying Parasite Eve 2 for the umpteenth time, it's got my brain a whirling.

How about a shadowun game set in the early years: I"m talking early 2030s.  This would be before the corporations took on the label of "mega" and the U.S. government more or less still existed as a singular entity.

Now, here's the twist (and the part I really want to hear feedback on).   I foresee two ways to make this game work: either you're some sort of government contractors (working mostly to try and keep the corporations from running out of control) or (optionally) time travelers from the early 2070s.

For a Government Contractors Game:
Magic use would still be new.  You'd be an adept of some kind: Regular adepts, Aspected Magicians, and Mystic Adepts would be allowed.

Non-human metatypes would still be rare.  Orks and dwarves would probably be on the edge of acceptance (take that human looking quality!), and trolls would likely provoke a WTF? reaction.

Cyber and bioware would be limited to standard grades.   Character creation would probably be prime runners, with some negotiation on stuff.

Fpr a Time-Traveler Game:
Character creation will probably involve a single sentence character hook.   I'm not expecting characters to be standard, but probably prime runners and/or something else (maybe higher resources for augmented and/or more karma for mages).
This message was last edited by the user at 07:43, Fri 21 July 2023.

That deep of a throwback as far as the setting would certainly be unique.  It would offer a lot of opportunities to dial things back in specific ways that could make the usual things player's expect or rely upon to be different in interesting ways.  Though the downside is there will have to be a bit of hashing things out to translate whatever version of the rules set you're thinking about using into the timeframe of the 2030s.


Regarding Government Contractors: Games centered around characters who aren't up to the usual Shadowrunner activities in the usual Shaodwrunner ways can be a real treat.  A way to interact with the world and do things that can be a fun remix of the things you'd engage with in a more typical game.  It might also allow the bypassing of certain gameplay activities that tend to not translate well to the play by post format, and inevitably seem to slow games to a halt.



Time Travel:  Can't say I've ever done that in Shadowrun before.  I think the circumstances are really going to dictate a lot of how such a premise would work, and potentially how well.  A group traveling back for a specific purpose is going to be quite a bit different than a group that was completely unprepared for such an event and ends up doing the "stranger in a strange land" thing.




Overall I think it's some interesting options you're proposing.  For better or worse there's a lot of broad area covered by these options that a group could do a lot of different things with, but there's plenty of opportunity for pitfalls as well if things aren't specified quite enough, so I think some greater than usual pre-game planning and prep would be a big help.

As I understand it (and I might be wrong), a large portion of the reason that the Shadowrun world is a Death World is because the corporations were allowed to run amok without any oversight.  If the North American governments don't disintegrate, then what?  Would the mega-corporations even rise to that level of power (as the current system has safeguards about this sort of thing)

Edit: Would likely be looking for a co-gm.

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The Time Traveler idea was more of an afterthought, but might be the more interesting of the two.    The characters (I'm thinking four) would pop up already knowing what events are supposed to happen and having technology (and knowledge) from some 40 years in the future.    It would be much more player directed, rather than GM directed (as the Government Contractors version would be).

What might bringing a smartphone (and the know-how to build/maintain it) into the 1970s do?   What about the information an initiate magician would have about the other planes or magical beasties?   How might events change if Alamais or Hualpa were assassinated before having the chance to rise to power?
This message was last edited by the user at 15:14, Sat 22 July 2023.

I have decided with much thought to go ahead and push the idea forward to see how things turn out.

link to another game