[Ed]

**Disclaimer** This is not a suggestion for a ghoul cookbook.

What areas of the Sixth World do you feel are ripe for either their own chapter in an upcoming book or their own book in general?  I was looking through the Sixth World Almanac tonight and found myself thinking about past runs.  I remembered thinking when Shadows of Europe came out how cool it would be to run around in Morocco and Ibiza and Casablanca.  Our group ended up going there and it is the stuff we still talk about nowadays when we're swapping war stories around the gaming table.

I think the entire Africa could do with it's own Shadows of Africa book.  Seems like the whole area (even extending out from Africa into the Arabian Peninsula and Middle Eastern areas would be an area chock full of interesting story ideas.

What are your thoughts?

[voydangel]

I really enjoyed the Seattle 2072 book, but wasn't very impressed with the Almanac. I suppose I am just more interested in the finer "narrow but deep" information rather than the "big and broad but shallow" information. Overviews aren't my thing. I like meat and potatoes. Personally I would love to see a "Seattle 2072" style book for Hong-kong, Chicago & London respectively. 'Runner Havens' and the like were awesome books, would like to see more of that type as well - with lots of good setting information - and some sprinklings of game info to boot.

[Ed]

I liked the Almanac and I think the production values on it were pretty good.

I know there are lots of countries in the Sixth World and I understand space requirements but it's maddening to me to look at a map and see countries on it that are not fleshed out with an entry.

I would like to see a little more game information put in each book, it'd be nice to get some new tech toys or what have you every time a new book is released.

Regards,


Ed

[FastJack]

You mean to have books that focus on specific areas (like Runner Havens, Corporate Enclaves, Feral Cities, Seattle 2072 or the upcoming War sourcebook)? And books that feature specific aspects of the SR life (like Runner's Companion, Corporate Enclaves, Vice, Running Wild and the upcoming Attitude Book)? Maybe some books that go in-depth on aspects of a shadowrunner, featuring gear and SOTA tech (like Arsenal, Augmentation, Street Magic, Unwired and the upcoming Runner's Toolkit)? Or maybe you just want quick-and-dirty little one shots that give you "extra" stuff (like 10 Gangs, 10 Jackpointers, The Rotten Apple: Manhattan and This Old Drone)?

The Almanac was created to put everything about the Sixth World into a single book to give new and old players a way to see how the world works. Hence, why it's called an Almanac. It's not meant for detail, but for reference. It's an appetizer, not an entree.

[Ed]

My above was not intended to be a shot at the Almanac.  I like the Almanac, I think it was a good book and I own the print and PDF versions of it.  It was a good effort at covering a vast and ever-changing Sixth World.

I wish that it could have covered all the nations of the Sixth World but that's not reasonable as the Sixth World, just like the Fifth is always changing and in constant motion and it's hard enough to generate an accurate almanac for our times.

I would also like to see '207-whatever' books for cities that haven't been touched on in recent editions like London.  I think a '207-whatever' book for Berlin (in English) would be awesome.  I enjoyed the various 'Target:' themed books and I wonder if there would be any interest in a Gazetteer style series of PDF's?  You could cover locations in a shorter format, kind of like the Manhatten book did for the New York area.  It seems to me that places like New Orleans, Sydney, Metropole' and other locations would be ripe for those style of products.

Also, now that I think about it, I'm a sucker for NPC books that provide unique and statted out NPC's for use in your individual campaigns.  And I'm looking forward to the PDF 'Parazoology' that Jason talked about earlier because I use paracritters all the time in my games and it's always good to have more statted critters available for use.

YMMV

[FastJack]

Sorry, I may have been a bit harsh in my post (comes from reading that after reading some posts on Wizards' forums...)

[Frankie the Fomori]

I think a quick book on corporate compounds (different types I.E: a cargo transfer hub, corporate offices, corporate facility for Cyber/Bio manufacturing, Zero zone lay out, different levels of security that corps would have?), types of homes and what they look like (floor plans) for the different lifestyles, detailed generic NPC's, one example of low level, experience running team, and Prime running team would be awesome. It would be a resource that targets both players and GM's...and it would give us a better idea of what places look like in 2072, and a resource that allows us to better detail our own facilities.

[Nomad Zophiel]

I'd like to see an even narrower and deeper focus. Seattle 2072 was great but Seattle is the default setting for SR so there's plenty of room to expand on what's there while still leaving plenty fo room for individual GMs to add their own flavor. Every district in Downtown could easily be expanded to a full chapter worth of locations, NPC's and adventure seeds. The International District, Elven District, the Orc Underground and others are at least as rich in detail as the Aztechnology Pyramid or the former Renraku Arcology. The same thing goes for any neighborhood in Seattle, really. Surely Dante's Inferno deserves more than a paragraph.

Edit: Granted, this could also be a series of full adventures where each serves as an introduction to locations, factions etc.

[voydangel]

I understand what the almanac was, and it was good production value. I was just saying it's not my preferred style of book.

[FastJack]

I like the style of the book because it's the first of its kind in the SR books. A concise and complete introduction to the history of the Sixth World and all the places.

[Ed]

After thinking about it some more, I think there might be a viable market for PDF's or booklets or something covering areas that the Almanac could not address for whatever reasons.  Some of the countries of Africa, South America and Eastern Europe and the Med areas.

I know MilSpec is coming out but I really enjoyed the SOTA books as well and I think a 10 year jump in the game timeline along with the transition from Wired to Wireless could certainly justify it.

I also give Frankie's idea a thumbs up, those would be useful books for any of us to have access to, no matter what level of game you're running.

[Chaemera]

Also, keep in mind, those countries that are a border and a name. . . are a ripe play ground for your own game to set your own rules. Don't like how politics runs in Seattle? Pick a po-dunk city in the CAS and use the four pages of description in the Almanac as a loose framework and go to town. Right now, my group are stomping around the Norfolk sprawl (which has a total of one official paragraph written about it in SR4 books that I've seen).

It helps that we live there and I like world building, but that doesn't have to stop anyone. It's an alternate timeline with magic and insane technology, you could pick Nashville and decide that with the influx of magic, the King is back as a Free Spirit who's decided to make himself the mayor-for-life. His policies have put him at odds with state officials, but his local popularity and international fame make it difficult for them to move against him.

Don't get me wrong, I'd love to see sourcebooks for the cities you've mentioned, and the corporate locations books previously discussed make great pdf booklets that I would go after like a fat-kid in a candy store. I'm just saying that if you're GMing and a blank spot on the map irritates you, you're looking at it wrong. It's not information you're missing, but rather an invitation for you to put your own fingerprints on the Shadowrun universe in a serious way.

[Ed]

That's a good point.

One of the things I enjoy about SR is that they tend to give a paragraph or two on the majority of the areas they address in almost any sourcebook and that leaves plenty of wiggle room for a creative GM.

Still, I like knowing a little bit about every place, that way the PC's can get briefed on it to and the characters feel more worldly about what's going on outside their particular patch. 

[etherial]

Don't get me wrong, I'd love to see sourcebooks for the cities you've mentioned, and the corporate locations books previously discussed make great pdf booklets that I would go after like a fat-kid in a candy store. I'm just saying that if you're GMing and a blank spot on the map irritates you, you're looking at it wrong. It's not information you're missing, but rather an invitation for you to put your own fingerprints on the Shadowrun universe in a serious way.

Like Shadows of Delaware. Why was it the only state in the UCAS to not have its capital on the 6WA map? What happened to the pre-Shiawase Decision haven for corporate headquarters? Answer for yourself.

[Ed]

Deleware is a hotbed of Shadow activity even today.  One can only imagine the deviltry that will occur in 2070.  Documenting such a complex shadow ecology is best left to the professionals.