New Shadowrun deck-building card game

On 14 December 2012, Catalyst Game Labs linked to a mysterious video, hinting at something big for the Shadowrun Universe. And boy, they did not dissappoint! 2013 is going to be the Year of Shadowrun! :-)

Apart from a new edition for the RPG, a miniature game, a "European style board game", and the two upcoming video games, they have announced a new Shadowrun card game, "Shadowrun: Crossfire"! This is the official announcement:

For the first salvo of the year, Catalyst will publish Shadowrun: Crossfire, The Adventure Deckbuilding Game. Designed by Fire Opal Media, it features the very best designers in card games: Gregory Marques, Mike Elliot, Rob Watkins, Rob Heinsoo, Jay Schneider and James “Jim” Lin.

Shadowrun: Crossfire is a cooperative deck-building card game for two to four players set in the gritty, cyberpunk fantasy world of Shadowrun. Play a shadowrunner team and take on tough jobs such as protecting a client who’s marked for death, shooting your way out of downtown when a run goes sour, or facing down a dragon. In each game you’ll improve your deck with a mix of strategies while earning Karma to give your character cyber upgrades, physical augmentations, magical initiations, weapons training and Edge.

Shadowrun: Crossfire includes an obstacle deck, black market deck, race and role cards, scenario cards, augmentation stickers, and personal missions that test a team’s allegiances.
“We designed Crossfire to take deck-building games to a new level, by combining RPG elements with cooperative gameplay,” said co-designer Mike Elliott. “The result is a challenging game system that keeps evolving.”

When starting this blog, I would have never dreamt of this coming true! If you have other bits of information, please let me know omae!

Update for the Amerindian Expansion

And the good things keep coming - finally getting some work on this blog done! :-)

I have updated the Amerindian Expansion for the latest version of the template  (Download). So we now have two finished two sets for the current template version: the fan-made Amerindian one and the unreleased yet official Corp War expansion (Download)... Enjoy!

Finding Suitable Artwork

So let's say you're interested in creating cards with the MSE-Template and that you're looking for suitable artwork for your own personal use. Where to start?

If you're interested in some of the original copyrighted SR-Artwork, I'd recommend the following:

• Shadowrun cover artworks on Best Game Wallpapers
• The book High Tech & Low Life: The Art of Shadowrun (Amazon Link)
• There's also tons of color artwork in the newer major Catalyst Labs publications, such as SR 4: Anniversary Edition, Shadowrun 2050, Seattle 2072, or the Sixth World Almanac. So check them out for some of the newer great artwork!
• These days, it's also quite common for the illustrators themselves to showcase their artwok on personal websites, blogs, and art sites (particularly on deviantART or CGHUB). I've compiled a downloadable MS-Excel list of 154 Shadowrun Artists and their associated weblinks. As you can see, I've become quite obsessed with tracking down all the people that have ever contributed to the growing corpus of original Shadowrun art. Notable illustrators with Shadowrun art online include Andreas "AAS" Schroth, John Zeleznick, Klaus Schwerwinski, Tom Baxa, Jeff Laubenstein, and Paul Bonner.

If you're looking for non-original artwork that has a cyberpunk/Shadowrun type of feel to it, check out these sources:

• There's a Shadowrun art thread on the RPG forums, featuring both original and non-original art.
• There are various Shadowrun art groups on deviantART, e.g. the Shadowrun-Collection group, or the Shadowrunners-Unite group.
• Concept Ships is an amazing website with art for technical stuff (e.g. drones, weapons, vehicles, urban skylines etc.).
• Also consider googling for random collections of cyberpunk art, such as this one, or this one

Another useful website I can recommed is TinEye reverse image search, which helps you in finding the coypright holder of a given image, as well as in finding higher resolution versions of the same image.

Please let me know, if you have other great sources and tools you'd recommend! I'd be happy to update this blog post with all the information you contribute...

Finally: Corp War Expansion and New Template Version

It took a lot longer than expected, but I have finally uploaded a new version of the template as well as the entire Corp War Expansion as a MSE-Set (without images). For the three cards shown in this post, I have used artwork by Andreas "AAS" Schroth and by Doug Andersen. Note that these images are copyrighted and were used without permission, which is why I won't make them available as part of the MSE-Set. It's just an illustration of what you can do on your own for fandom-purposes.

Download:

• New Shadowrun MSE-Template (2012-10-06)
• Corp War Expansion MSE-Set (2012-10-06, no images)

Disclaimer:
Shadowrun is a registered trademark of The Topps Company, Inc (© 2001-2012). All Rights Reserved. Used without permission. Any use of The Topps Company's copyrighted material or trademarks on this blog should not be viewed as a challenge to those copyrights or trademarks. Card images produced with the program Magic Set Editor are created strictly for entertainment purposes and are in no way being used as a way of monetary gain.

  

Unfortunately, the new template version introduces some backwards-compatibility issues, which means that you'll have to adjust the cards you have already created. Sorry about that! Please let me know if you find other issues or if you have feature requests! Main changes in the new template version (2012-10-06):

• The keyword field no longer exists on any card. This allows for better resizing and editing dynamics.
• Threat rating, card name, and the copyright line are now combined text fields. This allows you to easily switch between body and attack values with the left and right arrow keys, or between a runner's name and profession (e.g. between Hatchetman and Street Samurai).
• New text field: "Illustrator"
• New set fields and descriptions
• Other minor layout changes and bug fixes. 

For those new to this blog, you'll find the updated release notes and install instructions below.

Install Instructions:

• Download and install the Magic Set Editor (MSE) 2.0.0, (if you’re having trouble with the installer, read this forum post)
• Download and install Wordman’s Shadowrun fonts. Unpack the “Shadowrun-12.zip” and install the four TTF files, starting with “SHADRG__.TTF” (right click them and select install). You don’t need the other files.
• Download and install the latest Shadowrun MSE-Template (2012-10-06)
• Run MSE, select “New set” and then select the Shadowrun template with the default style sheet. WARNING: On most displays, the card displayed will be too large. To remedy this, open the edit menu, select preferences, go to the display tab and change the zoom to either 75% or 50% of normal size. You need to restart MSE after.

Notes on Using the Template:

• Combined Text Fields: There are a number of combined text fields (the main text field, the card's name field, the copyright line, the threat rating) where you have to use the arrow keys to change between the fields.
• Card Type: You can change the card type (e.g. from Challenge to Contact) by clicking on the colored frame of the card. If you want to create a card with a different orientation (e.g. a location or an objective card), you have to change to the style tab, select the landscape style sheet and then return to the cards tab.
• Sleaze Requirements: To insert the skill icons, use the first three capital letters of the respective skill (e.g. STR for Streetwise). “Or” is automatically replaced by an “or symbol”, while you can simply use the number keys for the skill exponents. Alternatively, you can also make use of the format menu and the insert symbol function. Note that it looks best to also place one or two spaces between the skill icons.
• Auto Replacement: For convenience, (C) is automatically replaced with the copyright symbol, TM with the trademark symbol, (Y) with the Nuyen symbol, (O) with a dot symbol, and --- with a dash in all text fields.
• Rarity: Shadowrun cards don’t make use of rarity icons. This is why the rarity field to the lower left, right next to the copyright line, only uses invisible black symbols. Note that changing the rarity WILL show in the statistics tab and in the card list.
• Image: MSE’s built in image function is wonderful! If you chose custom size and uncheck the fix aspect ratio box, you can resize any image you want to use on the card. No need for manual resizing in advance.

Known Issues:

• Text Masking: In order to prevent the text from overlapping with the Nuyen symbol, the Sleaze Requirements and the Threat Rating, most cards use text masking. Sometimes this doesn’t work properly! Simply use soft line breaks (shift+enter) to manually format the text appropriately. This is an issue with MSE and something I cannot fix.
• Style Sheets: When changing style sheets from portrait to landscape, the default card type doesn’t adjust automatically. So you get the challenge frame drawn on an objective card, or vice versa. Simply change the card type manually by clicking on the card frame (remember that you first have to change back to the cards tab).
• Unusual Card Layout: Some unusual cards, such as Longhorn (with his massive rules text), or Impossible Mission (an objective with skill icons) cannot be re-created using the current template.

Stay tuned...

I just wanted to let you know that I'm busy working on some updates and fixes to the template, as well as putting together a MSE set for the FASA Corp War expansion. Things will probably take a while though, as I'm off on vacation and all that... So expect some more updates by early / mid September, but not before that! And please let me know if you find any problems with the current version of the template! Thanks!

Shadowrun TCG MSE Template - First Beta Version

Fan-Made Card. Illustration by Larry Elmore.

Hoi Chummers,

so I'm finally finished with a first version of a Magic Set Editor Template for the Shadowrun: Trading Card Game, originally published by FASA in 1997/8. So what are you waiting for? Go ahead and start making your own cards! I will not upload more than this one exemplary card, seeing that I'm afraid of lawyer-hell. Speaking of which:

Disclaimer:

Shadowrun is a registered trademark of The Topps Company, Inc (© 2001-2012). All Rights Reserved. Used without permission. Any use of The Topps Company's copyrighted material or trademarks on this blog should not be viewed as a challenge to those copyrights or trademarks. Card images produced with the program Magic Set Editor are created strictly for entertainment purposes and are in no way being used as a way of monetary gain.

Install Instructions:

• Download and install the Magic Set Editor (MSE) 2.0.0
• Download and install Wordman’s Shadowrun Font. Unpack the “Shadowrun-12.zip” and install the four TTF files, starting with “SHADRG__.TTF” (right click them and select install). You don’t need the other files.
• Download and install my Shadowrun Template (updated Version 2012-07-29 available). If you’re having trouble with the installer, read this forum post.
• Run MSE, select “New set” and then select the Shadowrun template with the default style sheet. On most displays, the card will be displayed too large. To fix this, open the edit menu, select preferences, go to the display tab and change the zoom to either 75% or 50% of normal size. You need to restart MSE after.

Notes on Using the Template:

• Card Type: You can change the card type (e.g. from Challenge to Contact) by clicking on the colored frame of the card. If you want to create a card with a different orientation (e.g. a Location or an Objective card), you have to change to the style tab, select the landscape style sheet and then return to the cards tab.
• Sleaze Requirements: To insert the skill icons, use the first three capital letters of the respective skill (e.g. STR for Streetwise). “Or” is automatically replaced by an “or symbol”, while you can simply use the number keys for the skill exponents. Alternatively, you can also make use of the format menu and then use insert symbol. Note that it looks best to use one or two spaces between the skill icons.
• Auto Replacement: For convenience, (C) is automatically replaced with the copyright symbol, TM with the trademark symbol, (Y) with the Nuyen symbol, (O) with a dot symbol, and --- with a dash in all text fields.
• Rarity: Shadowrun TCG cards don’t make use of rarity icons. This is why the rarity field to the lower left, right next to the copyright line, only uses invisible black symbols. Note that changing the rarity WILL show in the statistics tab and in the card list.
• Set info: In the set info tab, you can change the rarity symbols, give your set a title and a description, as well as enter the default copyright line. The text you enter here will display as the default copyright on all newly created cards.
• Rules / Flavor Text: The text boxes for the rules and the flavor text are combined, use up and down arrows to switch (sometimes one of them may be invisible). Font size will adjust automatically to the amount of text.
• Image: MSE’s built in image function is wonderful! If you chose custom size and uncheck the fix aspect ratio box, you can resize any image you want to use on the card. No need for manual resizing in advance.

Known Issues:

• Text Masking: In order to prevent the text from overlapping with the Nuyen symbol, the Sleaze Requirements and the Threat Rating, most cards use text masking. Sometimes this doesn’t work properly! Simply use soft line breaks (shift+enter) to manually format the text appropriately. This is an issue with MSE and something I cannot fix.
• Style Sheet Change: When changing style sheets from portrait to landscape, the default card type doesn’t  automatically adjust. So you get the challenge frame drawn on an objective card, or vice versa. Simply change the card type manually by clicking on the card frame (remember that you first have to change back to the cards tab).
• Keywords: Usually the keyword of a card (e.g. Challenge or Gear) is bold. On Runner and Objective cards, this is different. I’ve done this so that the user can add text right next to the keyword that isn’t bold (e.g. “Troll Runner. Stamina”). There is a way to script this, but I didn’t manage.
• Keyword Statistics: Currently, under the statistics tab, all possible combinations of keywords are listed (so “Challenge (Street / Electrical)” would be different from “Challenge (Electrical / Street)” etc. Ideally, I’d like to count every occurrence of every keyword and give the statistics of that. In the example above, you’d get “Street 2x” and “Electrical 2x”. I don’t know how to implement that yet, however.
• Unusual Card Layout: Some unusual cards, such as Longhorn (with his massive rules text), or Impossible Mission (an Objective with skill icons) cannot be re-created using the current template.

Please let me know of any other issues you may find. If you want to help me code, join the discussion. Enjoy!

- Greadle

Welcome!

Hoi Chummers,

inspired by the recent surge in all things Shadowrun (check http://www.shadowrun.com/ if you don't know what I'm talking about), I've decided that now is the right time to revitalize a game that has been released in 1997, which has gone out of production in 1998, and which, in all fairness, is completely unbalanced. You've guessed it, I'm talking about Shadowrun: The Trading Card Game, originally released by the now-defunct company FASA Corporation.

So in the coming weeks, I'd like to talk about game mechanics, rebalancing ideas, and, most importantly, about concepts for new cards and quite possibly about new expansions. Somewhat relatedly, I'd also like to use this blog to promote my Shadowrun TCG - Magic Set Editor Template that allows everybody to easily create their own Shadowrun cards. There are still some bugs in the template, but I'm confident they'll be fixed over time, with some generous help by people like you! Seeing that I hardly had any experience with coding or graphics editing, I'm surprised I've come as far as I have...

I would also like to use the opportunity to point you towards Blackwire's great blog on Shadowrun TCG decks. You'll find the complete card list (with rules) for the unpublished Corp War Expansion there, as well as the rules for numerous other fan-made sets created in the late 1990s. Note that Blackwire posts mostly in German, though, which is why I have considered this blog necessary in the first place! :-)