[WhiskeyRomeo]

I've been interested in playing Shadowrun for a while now. Well today I finally got my wish and I loved it and I'm eager for more!!

I mentioned to my group that I was going to buy the core rulebook on my way out of the store, excited to pour through the pages, start learning the intricacies of this complicated system, and sculpt a character of my very own. However, everyone in my group warned me not to waste my money, that the book falls apart and is riddled with errors, suggesting I just get a pdf version instead. The warnings were enough to convince me to leave the store without the book - opting to at least look into the matter. So I came home and looked into various reviews and such and sure enough I see my groups words echoed again and again everywhere. I also happened upon the recent announcement that a new printing of the rulebook is being released (soon? already?) and I'm curious if these issues have been addressed. I'm especially hopeful the construction quality has been addressed. Maybe I'm just fighting to ignore the copious "hints" to stick to the pdf, but I'd greatly prefer having a physical copy to hold in my hand and flip through whenever I need to look up something quick...which I'm sure will be often.

So, to sum up: Has the construction of the book changed/been improved? Has any editing been done, or is it a letter for letter reprint?

Edited: It was late and I was half asleep when I posted this, so I cleaned it up a bit and tried to cut down on the rambling.

[Beta]

FWIW my core rule book has stood up to a lot of use over a few years without breaking down at all (I may have broken down a couple of times trying to trace how some rule or other actually worked, but that is a different issue).  Anyway, I'm pretty sure that I saw somewhere that the new printing is using a new printing house, so old experiences, good and bad, won't apply.

As for eratta, I think there was a printing with a previous wave included, but I'm not 100% on that.  Even if this is the second update, they've basically fixed the burnt out headlight on a car with mis-matched tires, no wind-shield wipers, and a lot of slack in the steering system.  Yes, the fix will help, but it will still be 'interesting' to drive this thing.  That said, when you get used to it, it mostly handles pretty well and is a lot of fun.

In short, I'd say go for one of the new printings.  The book is actually not bad to read, it is more that extracting the rules-as-intended from all of those words can be challenging at times.  If you are liking the game, reading the book should be enjoyable for the most part.

[Redwulfe]

As a person who has had three books fall apart on him and one book that we put on our shelf and never opened fall apart we refused to bring shadowrun into our game store until they fixed the problem. The new printing exceeded all of my expectation and we carry shadowrun again. It is holding up quite well. There is still some errata that needs to be fixed however but we have noticed some new errata that has been added from the previous 4th edition for example: I explicitly now says you can not submerge or initiate at character creation. There are probably more that we will see once they update the errata to match what they have put in but it is a vast improvement on the older printing.

Red

[WhiskeyRomeo]

I'm pretty sure that I saw somewhere that the new printing is using a new printing house, so old experiences, good and bad, won't apply.

Yeah, one of my fellow runners thought he read that somewhere, but I searched and couldn't find anything to confirm it.

Even if this is the second update, they've basically fixed the burnt out headlight on a car with mis-matched tires, no wind-shield wipers, and a lot of slack in the steering system.  Yes, the fix will help, but it will still be 'interesting' to drive this thing.

LOL. That's why I wasn't so concerned about the errors. It was pretty obvious that it was going to be a slog trying to figure out the rules with or without them - kinda like adding one more knot to a giant tangled ball of Christmas lights.

As a person who has had three books fall apart on him and one book that we put on our shelf and never opened fall apart we refused to bring shadowrun into our game store until they fixed the problem. The new printing exceeded all of my expectation and we carry shadowrun again.

Wow. Well, I guess that was exactly what I wanted to hear. But I've never been so glad that I didn't get into Shadowrun sooner. Lol.



Thanks guys. What about the supplement books? I'm pretty sure I'm going to be building a decker and have my eye on Data Trails. Do those fall apart too?

[AJCarrington]

I believe that a number of the hardbacks have suffered from binding issues. Myself, I've been lucky enough to avoid them, though I tend to use digital versions a lot more.

[Marcus]

Naturally i think 5th edition is worth purchasing, that said, I almost exclusively use PDF versions. I do think the new covers are very attractive though.

[Beta]

I've only bought a few of the supplemental books in dead-trees version (I love me some physical books, but pdf cost half as much, so mostly I buy pdf).  Those that I do have in physical format have held up fine for me so far.  Mind you I take pretty good care of them, and as most are soft-back I expect that without babying the spines will crack, just like any other soft-back binding.