[Stainless Steel Devil Rat]

I think you can find the same things he found simply by googling the author's name.

[adzling]

i just read the section in war and tbh it's not bad imho.

it's not encouraging PCs to go kill holocaust ghosts, that's for sure.

[FastJack]

I think you can find the same things he found simply by googling the author's name.

Yep...

[adzling]

should i post the @ three paragraphs in questions so people can judge for themselves?

frankly i don't understand the hand wringing over this, in my reading it's not at all what folks on the interwebs have said it is.

is this even the right thread to discuss this?

[Banshee]

should i post the @ three paragraphs in questions so people can judge for themselves?

frankly i don't understand the hand wringing over this, in my reading it's not at all what folks on the interwebs have said it is.

is this even the right thread to discuss this?

One .. no, this is not the place (in my opinion anyway)
Two ... it's been almost 10 years since that book was released. None of those authors are even still active ... especially the one who wrote that particular section. Let it die ... it has zero bearing on current product

[adzling]

noted and agree Banshee.

[0B]

How transparent are other game companies compared to CGL in their processes/errata/criticism? I suppose the only other one I've paid attention to is WotC, just because of D&D, but WotC isn't really comparable to most TTRPG companies

[ikarinokami]

Paizo is pretty transparent and responsive.

[ikarinokami]

Plus, whoever wrote that thing clearly has no idea how Shadowrun magic items work.

Deep within the bowels of Auschwitz II during WWII, Dr. Eduard Wirths conducted and supervised thousands of odd experiments on the human body. He tested mustard gas on innocents. He mutilated twins. He held people in tanks of ice water for hours or until dead. He exposed prisoners to malaria. He forced them to drink seawater. One particular implement from his experiments, a rusted old scalpel, was left in the labs. Over many years, it was energized by the various ghosts passing by it, feeding off their death energies. At this point, it’s taken on a life of its own. The rusty old scalpel craves death. It only finds itself at home when flush with warm blood. Although this makes it a remarkably effective weapon, anyone holding it is subject to the sounds of its past victims. As a function of this, when the weapon is in hand, the character is considered distracted and suffers a –4 dice pool modifier to all Perception Tests. If she attempts to Observe in Detail as a Simple Action, she only suffers a –2 dice pool modifier.

Reach: 0, Damage: (Str/2+4)P, AP: –2, Availability: N/A (unique item), Market Value: 10,000¥

This is a D20 modern cursed magic item, not anything that works in Shadowrun.  Weapon foci are a thing, and do what the author was groping towards, but do not in any way  work like this.

As to the dungeon crawl, how else does one interpret this?

For your average runner, Auschwitz II is suicide. Only the most enterprising groups will survive the trip. But such a trip can result in great rewards (see The Fleshfinder, below).

The section also goes out of its way to place an arms dealer peddling 'anti-ghost weaponry' in the area, with no details anywhere of what that would consist of, and the intended targets being the haunted spirits of those murdered in the camps.

The whole thing is disgusting.

Disgusting makes no sense. It's shadowrun. the whole setting is based on the premise that humans do terrible things. is the problem because it happens in real life? because we have human trafficking, terrorism. there is nothing wrong that paragraph or the adventure idea. 

[Arkas]

Paizo is pretty transparent and responsive.

As far as I can say, the same goes for FFG.

[Duellist_D]

I think you can find the same things he found simply by googling the author's name.

Might be a dumb question, but who is the author of said paragraph?

[Reaver]

I think you can find the same things he found simply by googling the author's name.

Might be a dumb question, but who is the author of said paragraph?

There were 4 authors credited for the book:
David Hill, Aaron Pavao, Michael Wich, Filamena Young

None of whom have written anything for SR (to my knowledge) for some time. Of those, I know Aaron was active until after the release of 5e... Filamena has written several other books for other systems.

Hill, and Wich are harder to pin down as there are multiple authors with the same names.... 

[ZeroSum]

If my memory serves, David Hill is David A. Hill Jr, a pen name for Olivia Hill.

[Reaver]

If my memory serves, David Hill is David A. Hill Jr, a pen name for Olivia Hill.

They seem to be separate people, but they do work on a lot of the same projects. I was able to track down a Bio for both of them.

[FastJack]

If my memory serves, David Hill is David A. Hill Jr, a pen name for Olivia Hill.

They seem to be separate people, but they do work on a lot of the same projects. I was able to track down a Bio for both of them.

Okay, let's nip this in the bud. No more discussing of the authors, it's coming a bit closer to doxxing them and their information.