From: schurman@cbnewse.cb.att.com (McGill Feighan)
Subject: Shadowrun - What's new in SR2
Organization: Flinger Network Control
Distribution: na
Date: Thu, 27 Aug 1992 21:45:43 GMT
Keywords: Shadowrun, Second edition

The second edition of Shadowrun was released at Gencon last week, and is
probably winging its way to a game store near you. If you're wondering whether
you should buy it, the answer (IMHO) is a definite "yes". Although the game
remains essentially the same, major changes been made to underlying concepts
and mechanics. In this review I'll cover some of the more significant changes.

The book itself is longer, 296 pages, up from 208 in SR1. It has the same
cover painting, but now includes rules for firing two weapons at once. And -
you may want to sit down for this one - it has an index! Many sections are
expanded and have more examples.

The most sweeping changes involve auto-successes, staging, and karma. Other
important changes involve character creation, initiative, weapon combat, and
spell combat. Vehicle and matrix combat have changed too, but my experience
with them is limited, so I'll let someone more qualified describe those
changes.

The concept of auto-successes has been deliberately removed from the game.
Physical Adepts can no longer buy them, and Armor now reduces the attacking
weapon's power (which lowers the defenders target number).

Staging still exists but is now always two. Staging numbers no longer appear
in damage or drain codes.

In an apparent attempt to eliminate karma powered characters (i.e. those that
spent little or none of their karma on improvement, but instead just bought
the successes they needed) you are now forced to spend 90% of karma on
improvement. The other 10% goes into a karma POOL that refreshes at the start
of every encounter. Karma can no longer be used to buy off your opponents
successes. Re-rolling failures uses 1 point from the karma pool. Buying a 
success permanently removes 1 point from the karma pool.
The restriction on raising attributes only once with karma has been removed.

Character creation now includes an option to allow more meta-humans in the
game by reducing the meta-human priority from "A" (4 in SR1) to "C" (2 in SR1).
Allergies are now optional. If a character has an allergy s/he get extra nuyen,
skill, or attribute points as compensation.

A simpler method is now used to determine multiple actions. After your action
you subtract 10 from your initiative score. As long as the number is greater
than zero you get another action. In an action a character may have one "free"
action and either two "simple" actions or one "complex" action. Examples are
given of each kind of action.

A lot has changed in ranged combat. The power level of all weapons have been
increased, especially heavy pistols. Explosive ammo now adds +1 to power.
Firepower ammo no longer exists. The dodge pool is gone, replaced by the
combat pool which is equal to (Quick + Int + Will)/2 [yes "2", not "3"]. The
combat pool can be used for *offense* as well as defense. Before you start
chuckling with glee however, remember that armor no longer gives you auto-
successes - it doesn't even give you dice to roll. You're going to need those
combat pool dice when the lead starts flying. Attacker and defender no longer
stage individually. Instead the defender's successes are subtracted from the
attacker's and then damage is staged up or down as appropriate.

In spell combat the force of the spell (instead of the attacker's skill) is
now the defenders target number. However, it seems easier for mages to cast
higher force spells because most drain codes give a target of force/2.

That's what I've found so far, post what you find - I'm sure there are
still a lot of "undiscovered treasures" in there.

Ralph Schurman                                  schurman@iexist.att.com

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