[Kontact]

Given that the next book scheduled is MilSpec equipment (because a warfare sourcebook would have been the wrong place for that)

MillSpec Tech isn't a full sourcebook, it's PDF suplement for WAR, containing all the gear they couldn't fit into WAR.
Most likely similiar in size and cost to Digital grimoire and This Old Drone.

The gear section of War! had some nice stuff, even if most of it needed a bit longer to cook.  It's a bit short as well, given how much page space was spent on Bogota.  I certainly hope this isn't like video game makers that hold something back from a $60 game so they can hit you with a $15 DLC pack a month later.  Granted the prices here are most likely lower, but it still seems like double dipping.

I don't mind a War! B-sides book for gear... 
It is the most compartmentalized topic and is pure gratuity.

If anything, I appreciate it being kept separate from the Bogata location/event, as well as a return to the promise of the digital releases.

[Cochise]

I've gotten updates on all the PDFs I purchased through DriveThruRPG, BattleCorps and Paizo when the original files have been updated from errata and such.

I just went through my relevant e-mail-inbox an the results are as follows:
Since 2005 I got these product updates for my PDFs that were exclusively bought at BattleCorps (which is more or less "the source" itself):

• Shadowrun 4 - update to Errata 1.3
• Street Magic
• Digital Grimoire
• Shadowrun 4A

I can't blame them for not necessarily providing a 1.8 version of the old SR4 rules and I'm more than willing to give them credit for providing a (two times updated) version of Street Magic with the new cover, but I never got updates for Arsenal, Unwired, Augmentation, Runner's Companion, Running Wild, Corporate Enclaves, Feral Cities or Ghost Cartels. I'm quite sure that at least Arsenal and Unwired do have erratae in their print versions that so far weren't given to me in an updated PDF file. Not so sure about Augmentation, RC and RW. Corporate Enclaves, Feral Cities and Ghost Cartels (all more or less on the same level as WAR! in terms of product relevance) haven't seen Errata either ... So my personal hopes for seeing an updated PDF version of WAR! are rather low. YMMV of course.

[Darkeus]

I have errata for most of my Shadowrun pdfs.  Not near my book but I know I have Unwired errata and Arsenal errata. Yep, and Street Magic errata.

I am sure errata will make its way out to War! as well, and it needs it when it comes to spelling and grammar.

Otherwise, it isn't too bad of a book.  Not great at all but decent for an area in Shadowrun I may never use in my campaign.

[Mäx]

I have errata for most of my Shadowrun pdfs.  Not near my book but I know I have Unwired errata and Arsenal errata. Yep, and Street Magic errata.

I am sure errata will make its way out to War! as well, and it needs it when it comes to spelling and grammar.

I wouldn't be nearly that optimistic, considering that we haven't gotten errata for Augmentation(German version has errata included)  nor Runners Companion(which even has an errated english version out as hard cover)

[Cochise]

I have errata for most of my Shadowrun pdfs.  Not near my book but I know I have Unwired errata and Arsenal errata. Yep, and Street Magic errata.

The problem there being: While I have access to errata for Street Magic, Arsenal and Unwired (as published) on the SR4 homepage I do NOT have an updated PDF that includes that errata for the latter two. I can live with that, since both these books are in far better shape in terms of structure, design and spell-checking. Regardless of my personal feelings about certain stuff in WAR! my main issue lies with its production quality. Given the fact that people paid 18$ for their "beta" PDF, FastJack's and your hopes for actually getting a fully updated version for WAR! are quite optimistic if not too optimistic, because books that have far less problems so far didn't get errata either.
And since so far I haven't seen any errata (separate or fully integrated) for my Augmentation, Running Wild and Runner's Companion (more or less core stuff instead of supplements like WAR!, Feral Cities or Ghost Cartels), I'm just not in the mood for benefit of doubt or optimism in general.

I am sure errata will make its way out to War! as well, and it needs it when it comes to spelling and grammar.

And I'm quite "positive" that I won't see something like that anytime soon ... unless of course the current debate about quality actually rings a bell with "the powers that be" ... something I haven't high hopes about either.

Otherwise, it isn't too bad of a book.  Not great at all but decent for an area in Shadowrun I may never use in my campaign.

More power to you, if you really consider this book as "not too bad" ... It's just a feeling that I and at least "some others" don't share.

[Otakusensei]

Given that the next book scheduled is MilSpec equipment (because a warfare sourcebook would have been the wrong place for that)

MillSpec Tech isn't a full sourcebook, it's PDF suplement for WAR, containing all the gear they couldn't fit into WAR.
Most likely similiar in size and cost to Digital grimoire and This Old Drone.

The gear section of War! had some nice stuff, even if most of it needed a bit longer to cook.  It's a bit short as well, given how much page space was spent on Bogota.  I certainly hope this isn't like video game makers that hold something back from a $60 game so they can hit you with a $15 DLC pack a month later.  Granted the prices here are most likely lower, but it still seems like double dipping.

I don't mind a War! B-sides book for gear... 
It is the most compartmentalized topic and is pure gratuity.

If anything, I appreciate it being kept separate from the Bogata location/event, as well as a return to the promise of the digital releases.

Let's be honest.  They put 31 pages worth of stuff to spend ¥ and karma on so people would even buy the book.  Without that it's the Bogota sourcebook that wouldn't move enough copies to pay for the printing and about 60 pages from the military operations book we'll never see complete.  You can spend $18 for the PDF.  Then they come out with another 20 odd pages (I'm guessing at size here) of the same type of stuff to spend ¥ and karma on, and they charge you another $7 (going off the last web sup.) for that?  That there sounds like horse barding to me.

[Chaemera]

I may be alone in this... I like the Bogota info more than I like the gear.

More gear and stuff is nice, but if I wanted a game that focused on digging out the best & most awesome gear to kill things with, I'd still be playing DnD. I buy these books for story, baby, a generic 100+ "here's the military stats and capabilities of the major players" book? Yawn. I'm not playing Warhammer 40k, either. A Shadowrun book needs a story to move, even the core supplements break 50/50 on story and "stuff", even if the story is broken into broad subjects (magical groups, network topology), it's still story.

I think, honestly, the biggest problem with War! is that they named it "War!", I barely pay attention to the product announcements and I knew it was a book about a specific war, centered around Bogota. If you expected something other than 70% Bogota, you had your head in the sand.

I like toys as much as the next runner, but it's not what gets me to buy books. I consider buying PDFs for the gear, but I'll wait and see what some of the people I trust on this forum have to say about Mil-Spec Tech before grabbing it. There seemed like a little much in the way of power creep in War!, and this game doesn't need more of that.

[Darkeus]

More power to you, if you really consider this book as "not too bad" ... It's just a feeling that I and at least "some others" don't share.

Yours is not an opinion that is shared by all as well.  We can agree on that, sorry you hate the book.

Also, "not too bad" also means not that good as well.  Average, decent, nothing spectacular yet not horrible.  I don't hate it like some do but I recognize that it is not the best book ever released for Shadowrun either.  Far from it.

 

[Cochise]

Yours is not an opinion that is shared by all as well.

May I ask where I claimed that my views are shared by "all"? Sorry, if this get's kinda rude: Learn to read / understand and refrain from making stupid assertions.

We can agree on that, sorry you hate the book.

And just another instance where I have to suggest that you should seriously improve your reading comprehension, since I nowhere stated that I "hate" the book. I pointed out that it has serious problems with editorial quality and that I - unlike you and FastJack - see no good reason for believing that I'll see an updated PDF version ... thus expecting that my so-called "beta" PDF (not my words, remember?!) will remain the only one I'll ever get within an acceptable time frame. No word about hating the product. If I were to "hate" the product I wouldn't even be talking here anymore with the dim hope that CGL get's their act together and starts to publish with better quality again. I'd just stop spending money on them ...

Also, "not too bad" also means not that good as well.

So? I never doubted that part of your answer, or did I?

I don't hate it like some do but I recognize that it is not the best book ever released for Shadowrun either.  Far from it.

Actually I don't even think about what you might feel, since your feelings - apart from your statement that the book is "not so bad" - have pretty much nothing to do with what I wrote or what I care for.

[blorgh]

I've gotten updates on all the PDFs I purchased through DriveThruRPG, BattleCorps and Paizo when the original files have been updated from errata and such.

As pointed out, it's "if" rather than "when – Augmentation has a second printing with corrections, but neither published errata (there is an unreleased errata since August 2008) nor corrected PDF.

[Sengir]

Much appreciated.  Been taking a closer look at the SWA so might be able to do something with maps from that.

The "maps" in the 6WA are modern-day satellite photos with Shadowrun borders and locations painted on. So geographical information is limited at best (go spot the rivers), and any changes in coastlines etc. are not reflected at all. Since the maps are in Mercator Projection, one could of course find places of interest with relative ease...if there was a grid on the "map". It isn't.

And errata? That's an in-joke, just like Holostreets.

[blorgh]

Maybe it's about time to get the source file of Wordman's Sixth World Map and update it.

[Sengir]

Maybe it's about time to get the source file of Wordman's Sixth World Map and update it.

No, it's time for CGL to find an answer to this.

Back in the day, German and US books were incompatible because Fanpro decided to just write their own stuff. TPTB saw that it sucked, so these days Pegasus (new German publisher) has to get approval from CGL before they change anything. Yet the books are drifting apart again, this time because our books correct stuff which the US publisher doesn't give a damn about.

And while we are at it, why not resurrect some other traditions as well?

• Instead of changing torublesome rules, release must-have equipment which ignores these rules. Reflex Triggers didn't make it, but SoftWeave Armor and military matrix gear do the same job.
• Spread similar stuff over at least five books if you can. One book for "not your average runner toys" kind of hardware? Nah, better one warfare sourcebook, one PDF supplement, one espionage book...

[Critias]

Spread similar stuff over at least five books if you can. One book for "not your average runner toys" kind of hardware? Nah, better one warfare sourcebook, one PDF supplement, one espionage book..

I'm all for constructive criticism towards things fans feel CGL is doing wrong, but this particular "sin" is hardly something to lay at their feet.

Street Samurai Catalog, Shadowtech, Grimoire, Fields of Fire, Rigger Black Book, Rigger 2, Rigger 3, Cannon Companion, Man and Machine, Magic in the Shadows, SOTA '63, SOTA '64...there have always been a ton of books that have hardware (and dis/advantages, and spells, and other new gear) spread out between them.  There are plenty of old SR1 and SR2 books that had crunch in 'em, and it almost always would've been nicer to have it all in one book, sure.

When you consider how much this trope goes back to first edition, it's a little silly to act like this is something that's just cropped up in the last eight or nine months.

[TranqFrollman]

Spread similar stuff over at least five books if you can. One book for "not your average runner toys" kind of hardware? Nah, better one warfare sourcebook, one PDF supplement, one espionage book..

I'm all for constructive criticism towards things fans feel CGL is doing wrong, but this particular "sin" is hardly something to lay at their feet.

Street Samurai Catalog, Shadowtech, Grimoire, Fields of Fire, Rigger Black Book, Rigger 2, Rigger 3, Cannon Companion, Man and Machine, Magic in the Shadows, SOTA '63, SOTA '64...there have always been a ton of books that have hardware (and dis/advantages, and spells, and other new gear) spread out between them.  There are plenty of old SR1 and SR2 books that had crunch in 'em, and it almost always would've been nicer to have it all in one book, sure.

When you consider how much this trope goes back to first edition, it's a little silly to act like this is something that's just cropped up in the last eight or nine months.

Which he isn't doing. He's explicitly talking about the resurrection of traditions that had better stay dead.