Review: Running Gear

Running Gear
Edited by: Gurth
Published: 1994
Formts: Word, RTF (Both A4 and Letter paper sizes) Location: http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/plastic.html

Running Gear was the first of the sporadically published Plastic Warriors net.books. Six have been published to date, and more are in the works, according to the creator.

Running Gear is divided into 7 main sections:

Update: The introduction
New stuff: Some stuff the Plastic Warriors came up with themselves
SWO Guns: The first part of the SWO guns file.
CP2020: Guns and Gear from Cyberpunk 2020
Explosives: Explosives in all shapes and sizes
Drugs: Expand the mind (Or waste it).
RadTech Inc. Equipment Catalog: alternative forms of transport

None of the stuff in the New Stuff section is over-balancing, and most of it could easily be integrated into an existing Shadowrun campaign. Some of it is a bit much for new characters, all depending on the power level you’re aiming for, of course.

The SWO Guns section is much the same – nothing too overbalancing, and nothing that really stands out from the pack. SWO is working on a Guns Two, check the website at Students of War and Oppression to keep up to date on it!

CP2020 is more interesting than the first few sections, in my opinion. It starts off with a few more variations on armour, and then moves onto some assault style vehicles. The firearms in this section are a nice range from the 325� street cheapies to 6000� rocket launchers.

My favourite part of the book was the Explosives section. At least one of the characters in all the campaigns I’ve run has the explosives skill and some C4. But they rarely use it.. This section has explosives contained in everyday items: Credsticks, light bulbs, Compact Discs, Pens, and more. If my players would clue in to these, I’m sure they would find themselves using that explosives skill more often.

It also includes the Explode spell, which is a big nasty boom.. :)

The Drugs section is the same as in The Compiled NAGEE (Reviewed Previously). The Compiled NAGEE also contains a bit more information on the subject, so if you’re looking for drug related stuff, I would suggest it over Running Gear.

The RadTech Inc. Equipment Catalog is a conversion of a file for CP2020, obviously based heavily on the novel Snow Crash. I’ve never had a PC in one of my games use these, but they’re the ideal annoyance to throw on your teams rigger. “Oh gee, there’s some guy pooning the back of the van, Chaz. Whatcha gonna do, you can’t afford to slow down, and she’s doing just that to you..”

Running Gear is a fancier book than most net productions. There’s graphics on each page, and a menu on top similar to Shadowrun sourcebooks of that time period. The problem is incompatability with various printers, so you sometimes have to do reformatting yourself.

Not much actual writing in this book; mainly descriptions and shadowcomments. Some very funny shadowcomments, if you ask me.. :)

All the vehicle stats are still SR2/Rigger Black Book 1 format, although I’m quite sure Gurth will convert them to Rigger 2 standards in the future and make them available.

My advice with this book: Open it in your word processer and read it through thoroughly. Maybe go through it with your gaming group, decide what you’re going to use, and paste that into a file all on it’s own, and print that out. That way, you won’t have a 90 page book with only 20 pages that you actually use during a game, and you’ll have less clutter.

And a final note: All opinions are my own. They do not represent Paolo Marcucci’s opinion, The Shadowrun Archive’s opinion, or anyone elses, only mine.