Q: How does The Caldecott Caper compare to the official campaigns?
A: It’s shorter. It’s more linear than Dragonfall or Hong Kong, but less linear than Shadowrun Returns. Overall mission and combat design is probably closest to Dragonfall; the game is fairly combat-heavy, and most fights are unavoidable (although you can sometimes tilt the odds in your favor with clever choices and uses of skills).

Q: How does The Caldecott Caper compare to Antumbra Saga?
A: It’s a bit shorter and less epic, but has more roleplaying opportunities and character development. I wanted to focus more on your teammates and the relationships you can build with them. It takes advantage of several of the newer features of Dragonfall: Director’s Cut and Shadowrun Hong Kong.

Q: Should I play Antumbra Saga before The Caldecott Caper?
A: I generally recommend people play The Caldecott Caper first: it's more polished and has a smoother difficulty curve than Antumbra Saga. If you like The Caldecott Caper, you can continue the metaplot with CalFree in Chains. If you love The Caldecott Caper, you can go back to Antumbra Saga to learn more about the background of the events in CalFree and several characters you'll meet. That said, people have played these three games in every possible order and enjoyed the experience, so it's up to you!

Q: What kind of character should I make?
A: All archetypes should be viable. The Caldecott Caper is more combat-heavy than Hong Kong, so playing as a Street Samurai or Mage is easier than a Decker or Face. If you plan to play as an Awakened character, be sure to put at least one point into a casting skill at character creation.

Q: Romance!
A: That’s not a question.

Q: ROMANCE!!!
A: Okay, fine. Here are some things to keep in mind:

• Romances are completely optional.
  
• Pursuing a romance is a roleplaying decision, not a gameplay one. It will affect the story, but it won’t provide any in-game benefits such as karma, abilities, or items.
  
• There are two potential romance interests, one male and one female.
  
• Both love interests can be romanced by any player character. There’s no gating based on metatype, archetype, or gender. (They do have to like you, though, and your character needs to have expressed interest in romance.)
  
• If you're pursuing a romance, speak with your partner frequently. You have a limited amount of time to "lock in" your romance.

Q: Is there developer commentary in this campaign?
A: What a prescient question! Yes, there is. By checking the box in your PDA options labeled "Enable Audio Commentary", you will enable non-audio commentary throughout The Caldecott Caper, in which I blather about how and why I did various things within the mod. Strongly discouraged for first-time players, as the commentary spoils events within the campaign.

Q: Who made this thing?
A: Me! More details in the credits.

Q: Is there a DRM-free version?
A: Yes. If you own a non-Steam version of Shadowrun: Hong Kong, you can download the campaign from https://www.calfree.net/.


Q: Why is this so hard?!
A: The Caldecott Caper uses the same game engine and enemy types as Hong Kong, but does not have as many alternate routes to success. You’ll be facing combat more frequently, so harder difficulty settings are proportionally more difficult than in the Hong Kong campaign. If you're having trouble, here are some things to try.

• Don’t hesitate to bump the difficulty down a notch. This is especially true if your main character is not a combat-focused archetype.
  
• Always bring a full team along with you. In the first run or two, you might want to hire someone like Lucky Strike.
  
• Some fights are optional. Explore and see if there are alternate ways to avoid conflict.
  
• Finally, if a particular mission still seems too hard, you might try running other missions first to gain more karma and nuyen.

Q: Why can't I install cyberware?
A: Your character will need access to a ripperdoc and some amount of leisure time before they can undergo the surgery necessary to install new implants. You'll be able to do this after traveling to Halferville to recruit a pyro. If your character specializes in cyberware affinity at creation, you'll start off with some hand razors to carry you over.