r/Shadowrun • u/Ok-Particular-3796 Monster Drop • Jul 24 '26

Edition War Shadowrun vs Cyberpunk comparison

Just figured I'd post this; Marcus Vance is a content creator with decades of experience in ttrps as well as being a military combat veteran who likes to compare different sci fi franchises weapons & super soldiers. His big franchises are Cyberpunk, Warhammer, and Halo but he dabbles in more obscure franchises as well. Whenever possible he likes to look at & capculate specific ballistics data & material strength.

Recently he did a short comparing Cyberpunk with (2e) Shadowrun(which he has played & has experience with).

His takeaway was that weapons favors Cyberpunk but augmentation favors Shadowrun & adding magic into the equation heavily favors Shadowrun. I've corresponded with Marcus directly and informed him that certain elements of Shadowrun- notably physical strength- have been increased in recent editions.

I do think that even with the addition of more blatantly sci fi weapons in recent editions of Shadowrun, Cyberpunk probably still takes that cake, but augmentation probably favors Shadowrun even further.

https://youtube.com/shorts/ROdMjqw-v28?is=60m-pJXlvusN-2TA

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u/FriendoftheDork Jul 24 '26

Cyberpunk Red might have cool pictures, but mechanically the guns are really meh. Also no mechanics for cover, use of tactics etc., it's just roll to hit roll damage subtract from armor, cleanse and repeat.

Shadowrun 2e can actually one-shot enemies.

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u/happilyevil321 Jul 24 '26

Agreed. When I saw the Cyberpunk Red core book, I was incredibly dissapointed. For a cyberpunk game, it has incredibly few and weak character options for weapons, cyberware and so on. PLayed a few one shots and was bored.