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Title: Rigger2: A Shadowrun Sourcebook by FASA Corporation, Staff F A. S. A. Corporation ISBN: 1-55560-304-1 Publisher: McGraw Hill - NTC Pub. Date: October, 1997 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $20.00

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Average Customer Rating: 4 (12 reviews)

Rating: 4
Summary: great book, just ignore the editorial mistakes
Comment: Ignoring a few glaring problems, Rigger 2 is one of the best Shadowrun supplements to date. It has taken the rigger character from a rather substandard runner to a integral and necessary part of a Shadowrunning team. The new vehicle combat rules are a bit more involved than the old ones, but give a more clear cut sense of exactly what is going on, and what a driver can and can not accomplish. They also make the driver's role more important; if the driver isn't doing do well, the rest of the team suffers the loss of actions - this part of the new rules also eliminates that pesky problem of characters with wired reflexes being as good with vehicles as those with VCRs. Rules for drones have been expanded, and finally, drones are useful as opposed to nifty, CF-hogging gadgets. Another addition in this tome is the concept of electronic warfare. This brings an additional level of depth to the rigger's repitoire, as well as adding another hassle to the poor chummer's life. It is also one of the most confusing and worst edited parts of the book. It may take a few read throughs of this section before you figure everything out. The most glaring typos occur during the vehicle design section, where several cost tables have numerous mistypings among them. Other than those, this section of the book is perhaps the most pleasing, allowing the player to design his own vehicle from the ground up. As usual, FASA has also added some new gadgets - one such: the cranial remote control deck. (I thought you might smile at that.) I would have given this book a 10 except that there are several obvious typos, and it lacks descriptive artwork that I feel was much needed for the vehicle design section, and the vehicle listing (which gives stats on all the vehilcles and drones printed to date.) Also, the CF storage requirement for drones was left out of the vehicle listing. I guess they didn't want those old copies of the Rigger Black Book taking up space in landfills. I definately recommend it as a good addition to any Shadowrun campaign, I just wish FASA had made us wait a month longer for it and fixed all those problems.

Rating: 3
Summary: Nice, if that's what you're into
Comment: I bought this book thinking that it would simplify the rules presnted in the Shadowrun 2nd ed. rules. It didn't. To be fair, it realistically represented what the cars and riggers would do. However, the action is slowed down because there is an entirely new set of rules to learn (to add on to the combat, the decking, the magic and the adpet rules). The maneuver point system is very confusing, and the new rules for sensors and all that other gadgetry is horrendous if you are trying to have a quick game. It comes down to your likes. If you like a lot of detail, and want to run a bunch of car scenes (a la Knight Rider), you'll LOVE this book. It just didn't do it for me. I did like the customization rules however, which are in the back of the book. If you ignore all the rules in the front, just use the creation system, then use the new stats in this system, it is very workable. I, however, feel that the customization rules doesn't justify the cost of buying a new supplement. If you want the basics of the new system, but don't want the expensive rulebook, they're in the shadowrun 3rd ed rules. The customization rules are not there, though, so you may want to buy this book just for them (you can also let the riggers player use this book so he won't sit there looking at your main rulebook all night! :-)

Rating: 3
Summary: More Gear -- Good! / More Rules -- Bad!
Comment: The danger of expansion-type supplements to any RPG system is the tendancy to over-burden the system with too many new rules; rules that slow down play and can mire a session in number-crunching and extra dice-rolling. Unfortunately, the RBB2 does exactly that...

Don't get me wrong, the book is packed with some really good ideas and long-needed rules clarifications from RBB1, but in some areas the development team clearly missed the mark (for anyone who has already purchased the book, the new "flux ratings" in Sensors/ECM/ECCM rules are a prime example of this). Also, the modifications to the vehicle armor and body rules have really changed rigger combat, and I don't believe in a good way; we had two experienced riggers get their banshees turned into scrap-metal by one missile shot -- hardly a result conducive to enjoyable gameplay.

The new drones and vehicles are nice, and the vehicle creation rules are a long-overdue addition (though again, seemingly a bit over-complex). My advice: get it for the new gear, ignore the majority of the rules, and run off of rigger combat info from the SR3 hardcover...