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BattleTech Player Boards => Novel and Sourcebook Reviews => Topic started by: Dmon on 21 March 2024, 10:42:39

Title: Shrapnel 16 - Thoughts?
Post by: Dmon on 21 March 2024, 10:42:39

Shrapnel 16 has been out for about a week now and nobody has made a thread yet so I thought I would.

If you don't have it yet, get it here: https://store.catalystgamelabs.com/products/battletech-shrapnel-issue-16-the-official-battletech-magazine

Reading the editorial at the start I actually felt a little disappointed with this issue as nothing described really excited me. Now that I have read almost everything in the issue, I can confirm that a lot of the articles are just topics that do not grab me, but the stories are collectivelly something quite different. I would say that they tend to be quite dark touching on murder, fanaticism, betrayal, forlorn hope and even the decent into uncharted territories such as cannibalism.

This over all darker direction was really interesting.

Title: Re: Shrapnel 16 - Thoughts?
Post by: Angrii on 21 March 2024, 13:18:34

Color me intrigued... I myself am strange and unusual.

Title: Re: Shrapnel 16 - Thoughts?
Post by: Daryk on 23 March 2024, 15:16:56

Any more AToW articles?

Title: Re: Shrapnel 16 - Thoughts?
Post by: Caesar Steiner for Archon on 08 April 2024, 11:50:25

Of Dust and Dreams and Locust Alone were the two standouts for me this issue. I was expecting some kind of tragic twist ending to Dust, since much of the story was about throwing yourself on a grenade for your family. I wasn't expecting the finale of the story to be "anyway, here's the reasons the Society is totally cool and good, wanna join?" I generally don't care for Clan material but this one won me over.

Locust was a story that, as I think about it, could have easily been a dud. I can see a different version of this story that is really loaded down with exposition and it really struggles under the weight of it. But the author did a really good job of doling out information only when it was relevant and stretching that out over the course of the story. It's really hard to balance that and I thought the author succeeded where a lot of people don't.

Title: Re: Shrapnel 16 - Thoughts?
Post by: Grand_dm on 08 April 2024, 18:03:15

Quote from: Daryk on 23 March 2024, 15:16:56

Any more AToW articles?

This. I would buy them instantly then.

As a side note, I don't understand why the TOC is never included with the sales ads.

Title: Re: Shrapnel 16 - Thoughts?
Post by: Daryk on 08 April 2024, 18:57:10

Hence why I asked the question... :)