(Shadowrun 3e) Loose Alliances

I don't care much for Captain Chaos as a forum moderator. And maybe some of that is on me, the reader, not entirely understanding the nature of Shadowland as an online community. I'm sort of imagining it like a threaded message board, and so I see the Captain wandering into the comments nuking 10.2 Mp of discussion about the secrets of the mysterious Atlantean Foundation and I think "oh, wow, way to miss the entire point of putting this online and allowing for comments," but I guess, from the mod message ("I haven't the space or the inclination to include them all here. And now back to our regular broadcast.") that what's really happening is that Shadowland comments are in-line annotations of the posted documents, and so a long discussion among the "commentators" would actually interrupt the reading of the document. The physical form of the gaming book in our reality is, in fact, a diegetic representation of the fictional technology of the Shadowrun universe.

But even conceding that Loose Alliances is an in-setting artifact, I think Captain Chaos' moderation choices leave a lot to be desired. Like, seriously, what is this curation? "Lately, however, more and more of you have been clamoring for a download that dives behind the scenes on the smaller-scale, more localized contenders."

Don't get me wrong. That's a great idea for a Shadowrun supplement. In fact, I have strong empirical evidence that such a supplement might be one of 3rd edition's best books. But c'mon, what's the SEO target on something like this? "Um, I am in desperate need to know everything I can about the Atlantean Foundation, the Tanamous organ-legging ring, and the UN, but I don't have time for three different downloads. What do I search for . . . I've got it! 'Organizations that are smaller than a megacorp.'"

I guess what I'm saying is that the different chapters of this book could, quite easily, have been separate in-setting documents, posted at different times, to different Special Interest Groups, and I don't think I'd have had a problem with that. Certainly, less of a problem than I had with Captain Chaos popping into a potentially interesting comment chain about Atlantis and scolding the room about being insufficiently mid.

But that's not actually why I have a problem with the Captain's moderation. I get fiction, really. I'm not a humorless grump. . .

I'm a humorless scold, and me and the cap have beef because, when he was called out for posting Humanis (fantasy KKK) propaganda in a document about potential employers he said, "Your objection is noted, but Shadowland does not filter access by creed or ideology. Fact is, we do have some Humanis supporters logging in and fact is, some runners out there may end up working for Humanis or their ilk some day . . ."

And then he follows up with some nonsense about the board's responsibilities as a repository for professional knowledge and sunlight being the best disinfectant, but the commentor "Antifa" says it best, "Liberal drek. If you don't stand for something, you'll fall for anything."

Again. In the context of an rpg supplement, I'm glad this information is here, to round out the worldbuilding. And you don't get a hero like Antifa without some fa for them to be anti, but if I'm a Shadowland regular, I'm giving Captain Chaos the side-eye from here on out.

Of course, that's a rhetorical two-step Shadowrun books use quite a lot (so much so that I was certain they'd do something similar in the section about feminism, enough that I preemptively made a snarky comment in my notes . . . that proved to be completely unfair, so I guess Fanpro wins this round). I guess, if I'm really going to be a Media Literacy Guy, I kind of have to be cool with it, but it does mean that I'll occasionally have to read fantasy-racist propaganda written in a realistic-seeming racist voice and there'll be a treacherous part of my brain that thinks "are they trying to get away with something?"

And I'm like 99% sure that they aren't. I don't think you write such a glowing recommendation of anti-fascist action in 2005 unless you're broadly on the side of the good guys. And maybe the brief discussion of transgender women is a little awkward and off-point from the perspective of modern best practices, but when you compare it to the mainstream discourse at the time . . . it's pretty okay (though maybe they could have pointed out that 2064's established level of biotech pretty much rendered all potential anti-trans arguments entirely moot). However, when they round out the feminism section with radical organizations that go too far, and one of the examples a commentor gives is "On a good day they'll 'out' a rapist to every corner of the real world and the Matrix. On a bad day, the police will be lucky to identify his remains. . ." there's room for that 1% doubt to creep in. It's just . . . a little weird when people start condemning vigilantism on a message board where hackers and mercenaries gather to discuss the best way to commit (often violent) crimes for pay.

Also, I'm pretty sure that being broadly on the side of the good guys does not apply to Islamophobia, largely for reasons discussed in previous posts but continued here in Loose Alliance's depiction of The Islamic Renaissance Movement. I think the IRM is a conscious effort to go against America's implicit bias by depicting a group of good, reasonable, pro-democracy, pro-diversity, and pro-science Muslims . . . but it's one of those positive depictions that is so conspicous in its efforts to dispel stereotypes that it very clearly reminds you of what those stereotypes are in the first place. The fact that IRM offices are a frequent target for fundamentalist bombings doesn't really help matters.

I am certain that there are vastly more interesting things one could do with cyberpunk-fantasy Arabia than what they eventually went with. I'm hesitant to suggest what they might be, lest I give away my own shallow knowledge of the region, but, like . . . the class stratification of Dubai? A European dragon owns a major corporation with interests in the region . . . could a jinn own a rival corporation? Would that be interesting? (Actually, I have no idea whether Arabians would even find that acceptable fantasy fiction . . . my gut tells me that opinions would vary greatly). The established tech for 2064 includes fusion reactors and electric cars . . . so, like, the changing face of the energy industry, global warming, and the spontaneous re-wilding that accompanied the Awakening? I'm just pitching here. Things you might do instead of a New Islamic Jihad and the counteracting social movement it inspired.

Which is all to say, time makes fools of us all. I invite certain things upon myself by reading 20+ year old books, and I'd probably do well not to get too judgmental about them . . . but man, does Shadowrun's depiction of Islam bum me out.

Other than that, and a couple of examples of the book being way too on the nose about the parallels between orks and Black people (the leader of the Ork Rights Committee is described as being "Martin Luther King, Malcom X, and Huey Newton rolled into one"), I really liked Loose Alliances. It's an oddly-curated cross-section of parts of the setting that get frequently referenced but have not yet been fully explained.

On a more setting-nerdery level, I suppose it's okay but frustrating that some of the entries left me with nearly as many questions as I had at the start. The book cruelly teases me by casually mentioning the Atlantean Foundation's work in Ukraine, without actually drawing any actionable conclusions from the matter. And somehow, none of the commentors see fit to point out that "this elf's background check only goes back to 2012, as if they suddenly and mysteriously appeared out of nowhere" is a thing that happens so much it's practically a cliche. And even though the OOC section directly mentions the immortal elves, it doesn't actually establish how much influence they have over the Atlantean Foundation's work. 

Are they trying to reestablish Thera? Find its big-ass sorcery to put to another use? Get ahead of the Horrors for a change? What's the plan? Exactly how full of shit are the Danaan families? Tell me, I have to know!

Also, because I'm running out of places to mention it - VITAS, that's some bullshit, right? When talking about the UN, the book mentions that India and Africa lost a third of their population when international aid organizations were redirected towards richer nations (which, to be fair, still wound up losing a quarter of their populations, on average) and . . . what the fuck are we even doing here?

I don't hate it as a setting element. The whole "indigenous populations were closer to real magic and thus had a leg up when the Awakening happened" plotline is a little problematic, but if you go with it and assume that they had a magical cure to a disease that was ravaging the colonialist population, then certain . . . demographic inconsistencies start to be a little less relevant. 

And, on a broader genre note, "The Shadowrun setting is actually a narrowly-averted apocalypse" would do quite a bit to make the fantasy elements more of an equal partner with the cyberpunk elements. You could have these vast tracts of wilderness that exist because of a well-timed one-two punch of rapidly-accelerated reproduction of wild plants/animals and the rapid depopulation that accompanied the virus. People fled to the sprawls because when you're laid out with a virally-induced toxic allergy that's the worst fucking time for a giant tree to burst from the ground and tear your home's foundation a new one.

The metroplexes could be these high-tech, glittering Points of Light, claustrophobically hemmed in by encroaching, Awakened lands whose spirits are furious at the despoilation of the Earth, and all your food is synthetic and vat grown, not purely out of contemporary anxieties capitalist frankenfood, but because deadly paracritters are a major problem and if you tried to clear a farm in the vast sea of trees that is now rural Ohio, you will get fucking eaten. But the ruins of the old cities are still out there, and they are full of modern-day treasure. Maybe your off-the-books mercenary will go and brave the Manticore's lair to retrieve a legendarily lost bitcoin wallet or maybe it's a corporate-sponsored attempt to recover an advanced prototype lost during the . . . migration.

I can feel in my bones that this is potentially a great genre synergy. Cyberpunk societies where capitalism is more powerful than ever, but a fantasy world where not even capitalism can pretend to own the Earth . . . the melancholy grandeur of decaying suburbs turned mass graves, in the shadow of neon-lit skyscrapers whose close-packed density merely performs the illusion of strength. Elves and orks, dwarves and trolls, still human enough to cling to technological society, but something inside them was empowered by the very force that humbled the 20th century, and they know that they could thrive out there in ways that untouched humans could not. And worse, the humans know it too, deep down, and that's the crack that lets anti-meta sentiment thrive. 

So much was lost in the fall of the old world, so many people fell through the cracks. The corporations use them as deniable, expendable pawns, but for all their wealth and power, money cannot truly buy control. The mysteries of nature are alive and aware once more and there be dragons in the dark places, lost to human oversight. But then, even here, a person's got to eat and the hustle never really ends. The new world fights over the scraps of the old, and maybe even dragons could learn a thing or two from the endless chase for increasing shareholder value. . .

Except, that's not quite Shadowrun. I honestly think the writers forget VITAS even happened, except when it comes to putting an unspecified devastation in the backstory. In the real world, human populations took 80-200 years to recover from the Black Death, but everywhere, even regions that canonically lost nearly a billion people, are described as being bigger, busier, and more crowded versions of the places they are now. There's relatively little discussion about the potential effects of a mass casualty event on Seattle's notoriously overheated real-estate market.

Though, now that I have it all out, and now that I'm thoroughly convinced that a Shadowrun knock-off, set 200 years in the future, when advanced transhumanist technology could plausibly exist as dungeon loot, is a great idea and that I should immediately get to work on that . . . it's time to remember what got this started in the first place. Loose Alliances, a fun grab-bag of miscellaneous Shadowrun topic that has next to nothing to do with the last few paragraphs. It may have had a few rough patches, but overall I think it was pretty great.

(Even if Captain Chaos is a terrible forum moderator).

Ukss Contribution: "Vat brains to operate fighter drones." A simple idea, creepy as hell, that can easily be integrated into the setting. It's a no-brainer.

(I'd say "no pun intended," but I came up with that line accidentally, groaned when I realized what I'd done, and then decided to go with it anyway. You're welcome.)