[Sendaz]

With Earthdawn being owned by other parties now and not much being directly said about it, is the 4th World going to get a retcon so we can have a relevant history for the sixth world, especially for new players coming into the game? 

Seeing as a few other things have been retconned, it seems like the perfect time to go back and redo things a bit bringing the 4th age back into the game history, maybe even adjust a few things that the devs may have liked originally but in hindsight they wish they could have done differently.

[Critias]

Nah.

No fun in retconning stuff whole-cloth, really.  The Fourth Age isn't really all that central to Shadowrun, in my opinion (and I'm a historian by trade).  There's been a recent trend to downplay the ED connections, and I, personally, can't imagine us reversing that decision so drastically that we also re-write that history instead of sticking with what's already there.

[Sendaz]

But hasn't the decision to downplay the ED connection been partly due to the fact ED is now someone else's property so what you can do with it is sort of limited in any case?

There is nothing wrong with just going forward, but some cross-over bits and stories are always fun.  I would have liked to have seen more tales like  Aina's with one foot in the 4th Age and the other in the modern day or an adventure/missions showing glimpses of an artifact's origins from the earlier ages and its effects on being unearthed today.

[Red Canti]

When I saw the title I thought we were going to talk about Jack Kirby's Fourth World.

Imagine my disappointment when it turned out to be Earthdawn.

[Lysanderz]

Basically the only lasting tidbits from ED is:

Horrors
Ghostwalker
Dunkelzahn
Harlequin
 
and a few other minor things. And from what I understand, most of those plotlines (Harlequinn Aside) are tied up and done with. Dunkie watching the bridge, GW playing with his new spirit buddy, and Horrors going "Damn, nothinng to do..."

I saw look to the future and tittle around more with 6th world stories.

[Mirikon]

Other than Horrors, Immortal Elves, Dragons, and Bugs, most of the plot points of Fourth World have gone away over time. I would dearly love for someone to uncover the Books of Harrow, though. However, I agree that there isn't really any need to go and rewrite the 4th world to deal with those four plots. There's plenty in the Sixth World already that you can use with them and just move forward.

One of the few things I would like to see revisited are some of the different types of magic you see in the 4th world. Name/Pattern magic, for instance. You already see elements of this when dealing with spirits (having to use the True Name to banish them), but in the 4th world Names had power. There's a reason why in his will Big D swears on his Name that his gift to Juan won't harm him or Aztechnology.

[SoyCaf]

I wish dragonkin humans and T'skrang had been carried over. Things would get even more interesting.
Instead Shadowrun has an immortal jester elf, Thornbush elf, daughter of thornbush elf, Backstreet Boys look-a-like elves, Someone's favorite haunt elf and Frosty.

[Maddoux1]

Well, the Windlings are coming back as Pixies, and T'skrang are really just changelings.  *gets pelted with tomatoes*

I'm just hoping Deep Lacuna is something really cool like a kaer.

[Mirikon]

T'skrang will likely be viewed as Changelings at first. Clearly Lofwyr believes his man in Seattle for the artifacts craze is the one of the first to 'wake up', and collected him for that purpose. The DIMR has discovered what they called a 'Life Rock', and since Ehran is in charge of the DIMR, you can bet it is probably the real thing. Also, there are reports of 'rock-like men' serving the Sea Dragon near one of her lairs. Likely, T'skrang and Obsidimen required a higher mana level than orks and trolls to manifest.

And the Deep Lacuna is almost certainly an old kaer that has been kept 'out of phase' with the rest of the world for a long time. And it just so happens that there is something down there that is disrupting some very powerful spirits ritual teams have sent down to check things out. There are other places that certainly appear to be kaers popping up elsewhere in the world, such as in Russia (or the spirit-controlled part of what used to be Russia).

[Maddoux1]

Yeah, I'm really not seeing anybody *really* back away from the ED/SR connections.  (Though my tabletop group that I run calls me an SRED Shipper.  They really don't get chronology...)

The world doesn't change, just the stories that are told.  While I will, eventually, run the two games and have subtle ties between the stories, for the most part the stories that come from the 4th age (as far as current editions go) won't have much impact in the 6th.

Just like I remember reading many years back that someone was planning on putting out an 8th Age book.  In SPAAAAAAACE.  (I'm working on my 10th Age system already, after the space elves crash land on a distant planet lose all of their tech.)

I just don't see a need to shy away from the setting as it was before.

[BlackMyron]

IIRC, the "Atlantis" MMORPG in-game - a thinly-veiled Earthdawn - allowed people to play, alongside the races that did exist in RL at the time, 'lizard men' and 'earth elementals'....

[Mirikon]

Wasn't a certain very old elf involved in the creation of the Atlantis MMO?

[Maddoux1]

Yeah, but that would require a stretch to get them into the game.  Still, awesome that the way exists!

[IKerensky]

There is still some plot to finish :

Are the Atlantean, Théra or not ?
How did the Dragons and IE settled their war at 4th ages end ?
Of all the Therans colonies, wich one are still to be discovered ?
Aztlan looks very 4th world in shape and behaviour, could they be a Thera reborn faction ?
What of the true Drakes ? Did they rebel as the IE did ?
Where is Verjigorm ?

And the most important of all... How much time before the humanity realise that the Great Dragons are nothing more than a kind of horror and doesn t belong to the Earth.

[Mirikon]

The Atlantean Foundation was created by Alachia (under another name, obviously), the former queen of the Blood Elves (also former Queen of England, IIRC). The Black Lodge, however, could very well be of Theran descent, or descended from the Denairastas clan.
The dragons and IEs called a truce at the end of the 4th world, a truce that has (mostly) remained to this day, other than a bit of civil (if not friendly) gamesmanship, until Harlequin declared war on Ghostwalker.
Unknown what Theran colonies may have survived to be discovered these days. Some may have simply 'reverted' to normal ancient ruins, while some may be in astral space or other such things.
There's a reason Aztlan looks the way it does. That reason is the Smoking Mirror, which may very well be a Corrupted (or, worse, Horror-touched) Great Dragon.
The true drakes did not rebel. They are more closely bound to their makers than the IEs (and have a limited life span as well).
Verjigorm did not show in the 4th world, AFAIK. It is still FAR too early to talk about him in the 6th.

And as for your last question? Not going to happen.