Shadowrun Reading List

There's a heck of a lot of Shadowrun books. One thing that I'm always asked when people want to start Shadowrun is "What books do I need?"

The trouble is, that's a lot more complicated a question than it appears.

Shadowrun is extraordinarily complex, with a whole lot of possibilities. The more you know about these things, the better. Because of that, ideally, you should read everything.

Of course, with the amount of Shadowrun books there are, that's not really a practical approach. I've read a whole lot of Shadowrun books, and even I have not read anywhere near all of them. Although the game is now on its 4th edition, the only thing that goes out of date with the passing of an edition is the rules. The back story stuff all stays relevant. So which ones should you read?

What I've got here is a breakdown of the books, and what you should read. I've broken it down into absolute essentials, recommended stuff, optional stuff, and stuff you shouldn't bother with. There's not much of the last one though.

Also, the stuff you need to read is dependant on what kind of character you are interested in making. For instance, there's no point reading much of Street Magic if you are not going to make a magic using character. Because of this, I have also done separate sections for each of the major roles in a group.

Books

Head to the Waugh and also ask Joose/HereComesPete/The Shutting Downs about which books depending on what type of character you want to run.

Shadowrun 4th Edition The core rule book is a must (obviously). There's the latest 20th anniversary edition on the Waugh bar. Use this to get ideas of character type, rules and the overall feel of the shadowrun world. You can skip the stories if you want but they add nice flavour.

Runners Companion - adds more for your character and their life in the shadows, not essential but as close to it as can be.

Unwired - Hackers/Riggers/Otaku go and read this.

Digital Grimoire - Mages/Enchanters/Summoners/Adepts go and read this.

Seattle source book - Offers maps, places, people of interest and other such useful information on Seattle, the main shadowrunning city.

Websites

Dumpshock - A veritable bottomless pit of useful (and insane) ideas and information for shadowrun.