Shadowrun Dragonfall: Gameplay and Review: Page 4 of 10

Shadowrun Dragonfall
Is the Second Return Better than the First?


Character Customization

Neon beauty

The streets aren't safe at night, but it's almost always night.

Character creation in Shadowrun Dragonfall allows players to select the gender, race, and class “archetype” for their character, along with some fairly rudimentary cosmetic options.

Available races include human, troll, ork, dwarf, and elf. Each of the races have different bonuses, so that an ork might make for a great berserker capable of charging into—and through—enemy lines for close-range, very painful fisticuffs, but an elf might be more suited providing precision support fire, or sniping from afar.

Regardless of what race you decide upon, you are free to choose from any of the available “archetypes.” These archetypes are not classes in the usual sense; instead they are templates which provide something of a starting point that players can then build upon.

The Shaman and the Mage are the dedicated spell slingers of the Shadowrun world; the former calls upon, and can even summon, powerful elemental spirits and hideous demons to aid them on the battlefield, while the latter can cast bolts of lightning, streams of acid, or create protective barriers upon their allies.

Dystopian farmstead

A dystopian farmstead.

Street Samurai, by contrast, focus on mastering conventional weapons, such as blades, hammers, shotguns, assault rifles, and pistols—up to three of which they can bring to any given fight.

Deckers prefer to avoid a direct fight at any range, and instead work in the background to hack security networks, disable alarms, change the targeting information of hostile targets, and generally turning the enemy’s own technology against them.

Similarly, the Rigger tends to avoid direct confrontations, and instead utilizes their custom-built drones to heal allies, dispatch enemies with heavy mounted weapons, or lay down covering fire and smoke to assist with tactical manoeuvres.

Players who know exactly what they want can forgo the archetypes altogether and create their own character from the ground-up. The different skills and abilities are all fairly easy to understand, so even new players should have little difficulty in designing their own build, provided they’re willing to spend a little extra time.



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