In August 2016 we presented two offers featuring the 1998 Third Edition of Shadowrun, the cyberpunk-fantasy RPG from Catalyst Game Labs. The first offer, Shadowrun 3E Essentials, included the complete Shadowrun 3E rulebook and all its key rules supplements — everything you need for an Awakened campaign. The companion SR3 Sprawl Guide collection presented setting supplements about the Sixth World of 2060.
The year is 2060. Magic has returned and creatures of myth and legend walk among us as megacorps bleed the world dry. You’re a shadowrunner — a deniable asset, a corporate pawn — using bleeding-edge science and magic to make your meat body and mind better-than-flesh. Stay on the edge, and you may survive another run on the mean sprawl streets.
Shadowrun Third Edition (1998) is compatible with all the older 1E and 2E adventures. It’s widely admired as the last version of the original rules before the 2005 Fourth Edition took the game in new directions. (We presented Shadowrun Fourth Edition in May 2015, and revived that offer this past December.)
1. SR3 ESSENTIALS
[core rulebook and major supplements]
There were five titles in this offer’s Runner’s Collection (retail value $55.50) presented as DRM-free .PDF ebooks, including the complete 345-page Shadowrun Third Edition rulebook (retail price $18) plus the free Quick Start Rules for Third Edition, along with the revised Shadowrun Companion for 3E (retail $8), Cannon Companion (the gun book, retail $9.50), Magic in the Shadows (the magic book, retail $15), and the 16-page Character Dossier (retail $4).
Those who paid more than this offer’s threshold (average) price also got this offer’s entire Gamemaster’s Collection with six more titles (retail value $51.50):
- Man & Machine: Cyberware (retail $15): The 3E street samurai book introduces nanotech, updated bioware, and many delightful new wound effects.
- Matrix (retail $9.50): The last and best of the pre-Crash decking books introduces new rules for AIs and otaku.
- Rigger 3 Revised (retail $12): The 2003 update of the 3E rigger book includes advanced rules for robots, drones, ships, security riggers, and electronic warfare, plus an expanded vehicle selection.
- Mr. Johnson’s Little Black Book (retail $15): Dozens of sprawl sites and contacts, with many adventure ideas and encounters.
- NEW! The SR3 Gamemaster’s Screen and Critters (free): The 3E Gamemaster’s Screen plus its 48-page insert booklet, a bestiary of the Sixth World’s Awakened creatures.
2. SR3 SPRAWL GUIDE
[setting supplements and adventures]
This second collection of sourcebooks and scenarios examined the high-tech, high-magic, high-action Awakened world of 2060. The books in this SR3 Sprawl Guide covered Shadowrun‘s traditional campaign city of Seattle and the world beyond, including the balkanized nations of North America and, for the first time in the SR line, the Awakened lands of Asia. There were three titles in this offer’s Starter Collection (retail value $40):
- Sprawl Survival Guide (retail price $12): Daily life in all social classes of the Awakened world of the 2060s.
- New Seattle (retail $12): A huge and detailed guide to the Sixth World’s most exciting city, the runner’s paradise.
- Shadows of North America (retail $18): Send your runners all over the continent — the Native American Nations, the Confederation of American States, Tir Tairngire, and more.
This offer’s Bonus Collection had five more titles (retail value $61):
- Corporate Download (retail $9): The top ten megacorps and how to get them to hire your characters.
- Shadows of Asia (retail $17.50): Send your runners across the Pacific to Hong Kong, Japan, and beyond.
- Renraku Arcology: Shutdown (retail $6.50): The largest building in Seattle goes offline, trapping a hundred thousand citizens inside — but why?
- Loose Alliances (retail $14): The smaller organizations in the shadows, the ones most likely to help or hinder your runners.
- NEW! System Failure (retail $14): The final sourcebook/adventure in the SR3 line, paving the way for Fourth Edition (2005) and a changed Matrix.
Ten percent of each payment (after gateway fees) went to these offers’ designated charity, the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
