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Stephenls posted:So... I think the thing about Mike Pondsmith's R.Talsorian's Cyberpunk 2017/2020/RED or whatever is that you are going to misunderstand its creative goals if you go into it thinking it is trying to be a cyberpunk game that emulates non-trashy cyberpunk. It's not trying to be Neuromancer. It's trying to be Robocop and any number of other trashy 80s cyberpunk B-movies and also gonzo 80s cyberpunk anime, and especially "Bubblegum Crisis, as misunderstood by someone who watched it out of order on third-generation bootleg fansub VHSs in a world where the only available Internet was mailing lists and USENET." I wasn't criticizing and if anything you made me want to get around to checking out Bubblegum Crisis. (Although I have some problems with Cyberpunk as a person who's struggled with a disability even if it's not meant or merited. My hackles just raise up and I go, "So what the was the Humanity cost for my cane you jerk." It's just flippant and half-baked so it's easy for my rage-brain to start up before my thinking brain.) SkyeAuroline posted:
It's a bit soon, but new thread title? Edit : ack terrible snype. Have a picture of a cat. https://imgur.com/gallery/Y1gnS Xiahou Dun fucked around with this message at 20:32 on Dec 4, 2020 |
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Dec 4, 2020 20:29
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Xiahou Dun posted:I wasn't criticizing and if anything you made me want to get around to checking out Bubblegum Crisis. I didn't take your comments as criticizing it! And you should definitely check it out, if you're in the mood for very impressively animated 80s OAVs that have all the problems of wicked-cool media created during that era. I think it's aged better than most of it, honestly. Hell, just check out the first episode; it's reasonably self-contained. (The remake, Bubblegum Crisis Tokyo 2040, not so much. Catch the original eight OAVs, not the 26-episode TV series reboot.) Xiahou Dun posted:(Although I have some problems with Cyberpunk as a person who's struggled with a disability even if it's not meant or merited. My hackles just raise up and I go, "So what the was the Humanity cost for my cane you jerk." It's just flippant and half-baked so it's easy for my rage-brain to start up before my thinking brain.) Very fair. Cyberpsychosis when viewed through that set of priorities (which are, I think, a significantly more important set of priorities than "How can I emulate the bits of this wicked-cool anime I half-remember without importing all the context from that anime?"), is A Problem.
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Dec 4, 2020 20:43
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INCOMING TRANSMISSION SEMINAR COMMENCES NOW Treasonous Materials And You / Lesson 2 of 7 - Alpha Complex: A Serious House On Serious Earth Hello, and welcome back to Treasonous Materials And You. Before we begin Lesson 2, we would like to make a statement: These course materials are for citizens of Security Clearance BLUE and higher. If you are of Security Clearance GREEN or lower, we'd like you take this quick one-question survey and await further instruction. If I were to be sentenced to a painful public sentencing, I would least like to be... [A] Placed on Reactor Shielding duty and made subject of the new Dugg-R-TLC-produced educational docuseries "The Real Shambling Abominations Of Reactor Sector HDK". [B] Made to scour the Undercomplex for communists, mutants, traitors, and other ne'er-do-wells with the assistance of my trusty Undercomplex Specialist Care Package. [C] Be made to sample different flavors of Bouncy Bubble Beverage and rate each on a scale of "Delicious" to "Life-Changing". [D] Time served in the Maximum Fun Chamber. Thank you for your cooperation! Deploying memetic kill agent:  For those still alive*, congratulations on last week's promotion to BLUE Clearance! You have some very serious duties now, one of which stems from your closer involvement with Friend Computer's very own Internal Security department. This seminar will help you identify and eliminate suspicious materials that may cloud the minds of other citizens and result in the making of rash decisions.  Our sordid tale begins with a strange, hallucinatory vision of an Alpha Complex debriefing center. One can immediately tell that the author of this comic's view of reality is skewed - the colors are too muted, the dialogue sinister and ominous instead of fun and uplifting, and the art is an exaggerated and illogical expressionist portrayal of its subject matter. How upsetting! As the great citizen Leopold-I-FNK-17 once put it, "The only expressionism you should be doing is expressioning to the Computer your adoration, latest information, and admissions of guilt." In another deliberately confusing moment meant to shake good citizens' faith in reality and disturb the should feel about their place in the upward-mobility friendly Complex Of Today, Today, the man who comes to rescue our flat-topped hero (who, we may add, resembles noted communist icons Guile and Legion) then turns on him as well, threatening a lobotomy. In a confusing turn of events, our hero refuses to comply as a concerned Alpha Complex administrator does their duty to Alpha Complex with a power drill. He then wakes up at last, and our story begins in earnest.  Our hero is named King-R-THR-1, after the famous Old Reckoning hero [REDACTED]. This comparison is made increasingly obvious by every single other citizen's incessant need to say his entire name every time. Concerned citizens should note it is rude to refer to people by their full names and all times, and emotional damages resulting improper name usage could result in up to a 16,000 credit fine.  Our hero has been struggling to retain his faith in his Complex-mandated councilor, who is surely doing their best to treat such an unruly client. Being naturally shiftless and of little use to anyone, he has been falling behind on his job (as shown in a highly treasonous sequence in which a RED citizen speaks to a High Programmer and is not dealt their rightful justice when they do not immediately comply to everything said by their superior). Our foolhardy hero has a moment of clarity...  And takes his mandatory Happy Life tablets. However, rather than seeing the reality of the situation as he would with real-world Happy Life tablets, he instead sees treacherous images of old Reckoning schoolyards and living rooms. What follows is an exceptionally bizarre sequence in which a being sure to be the offending citizen-protagonist's terribly traitorous mutant id brings him back to a riot he apparently experienced in a filthy and underutilized area of Alpha Complex (unrealistic and communist propaganda, that there would be areas of Alpha Complex in less than pristine condition). During this flashback, he meets a woman he seems to have treasonous interest in, especially considering she is a mutant with a malformed spine and bottom:  The woman, apparently in the present and apparently reported dead (which is terribly unlikely in the annals of Alpha Complex's perfect bureaucratic process), goes on a rambling monologue demonizing the Computer, its pharmaceutical donations to poor citizens in need, and whatever other trite revolutionary phrases the author cares to lay on the table, abandoning subtext. Thereafter our protagonist and the woman apparently do something so treasonous, even this disgusting, Communist-produced filth cannot portray it in full.  However, some concerned citizens are fast on their way, shooting the treacherous doppelganging woman and holding our "hero" accountable for the earlier crime of stealing some RED clearance boots. Our citizen-protagonist, you see, is Infrared clearance and trying to make something of themselves without going through the authorized channels. Instead he must be propelled through cheap Communist plot devices such as motivation via the death of a woman. The concerned citizens threaten to execute the protagonist, but then another one nearby says some nonsense that, if it were to exist, would surely not be forbidden in Alpha Complex:  Like a coward, our protagonist sneaks off while the concerned citizens exact justice and commence hunting for him. We regret to inform you that at this point, the drug-addled mind of the Commie Mutant Traitor who wrote this apparently collapsed into putrescence, as the citizens are suddenly ambushed by Alpha Complex's famous Vulture Squadron and a squad of obscure "heroes" who are not referred to in any way as unusual:  Some more concerned citizens arrive to rescue King-R-THR-1, but discover his identity and nearly report him for termination, per the request on the termination list that morningcycle. Our heroes (that is, these new concerned citizens) make some hard moral sacrifices, however, as they must convince King that they are on his side to get him to turn his back. Then they deliver a well-aimed laser to the back of his head, ending his reign of terror once and for all...or do they?  Right off the bat, we'd like to note some incongruities: The presence of Old Reckoning stonework buildings in Alpha Complex is an unusual and highly unlikely flourish, considering the grand and glorious work put in to keep Alpha Complex in peak condition at all times. The unusually dour tone is at severe odds with the happiness and goodwill felt throughout Alpha Complex at all times. Furthermore, the presence of pun-based names and other quippy flourishes stand at bizarre odds with the comic's otherwise "Straight" (and falsified) portrayal of gritty life on the streets of Alpha Complex. As you can see, treasonous material can be easily identified by its confusing and disheartening post-structuralist art styles, its sour and unpalatable tone, and its utter detachment from reality. Next lesson we'll be tackling the second of six issues about King-R-THR. Due to the cliffhanger chapter title, it is an unfortunate truth that the extent of King's crimes have yet to be revealed to the Computer, and he has yet to be subject to complete clone wipe as a result. Farewell and until next time, Your Friend, The Computer  *Alpha Complex does not guarantee the safety, survival, or structural integrity of BLUE clearance citizens exposed to the memetic kill agent. If you begin to develop symptoms such as sweating, nausea, or rapid organic decay or cellular growth, BLUE clearance citizens are encouraged to immediately purchase a CyaNite Heavy Duty Sleeping Capsule at your nearest medical dispensary. If the CyaNite dosage proves inadequate, simply lock your doors and windows and remain where you are. Help will be there shortly.
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Dec 4, 2020 20:55
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Stephenls posted:If I recall correctly, that's about right. The first episode has a gang with the classic "Fist of the North Star mooks in leather jackets with the sleeves ripped off, carrying chains and knives and maybe baseball bats or something" character design who turns out to be killer robots who go berserk but then it turns out they were a corporate op, and then later the show has lots of other gangers with the exact same character designs but they're not robots, and the killer robots in later episodes are either, like, malfunctioning construction droids or just minions of the show's corporate supervillain. Except for the one episode where they're the replicant cast of Blade Runner except lady vampires who've escaped the offworld colonies and are just trying to survive on earth (but they need human blood to keep their robot bodies running). The bit about the assassinated journalist comes from opening to the BGC manga side story A.D. Police Files. A D. Police Files does explain what why Boomers go insane and rampage (outside if the cover-up for a black ops), like people rebuilding and reselling scrapped Boomers, occasionally keeping memories in their data banks. Stephenls posted:BGC is a hell of an anime. I rewatched the original OVA and the first three episode arc isn't very good but the episode with the vampire lesbian replicants is where it gets GOOD. Like, when someone mentions Bubblegum Crisis, they almost always bring up something from the later half of the series.
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Dec 4, 2020 21:00
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Stephenls posted:So... I think the thing about Mike Pondsmith's R.Talsorian's Cyberpunk 2017/2020/RED or whatever is that you are going to misunderstand its creative goals if you go into it thinking it is trying to be a cyberpunk game that emulates non-trashy cyberpunk. It's not trying to be Neuromancer. It's trying to be Robocop and any number of other trashy 80s cyberpunk B-movies and also gonzo 80s cyberpunk anime, and especially "Bubblegum Crisis, as misunderstood by someone who watched it out of order on third-generation bootleg fansub VHSs in a world where the only available Internet was mailing lists and USENET." Yeah, Pondsmith's source text isn't Neuromancer or Islands in the Net. It's Hard Wired, which is very much at the trashy end of the cyberpunk spectrum.
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Dec 4, 2020 21:29
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To: TK_Nyarlathotep-V-SEP From: Epicurius-V-HOS Re: New Seminar Material At HPD&MC, we have some concerns about the effects of the expansion of the "Treasonous Materials And You" seminar to all new Blue Citizens. While we recognize the need for all citizens to be aware of the insidious effects of Communist propaganda, studies are showing that exposure to this material is leading to a decrease of productivity by participants of .72%, as well as an average decreased mood of 5.2 points on the Happiness Satisfaction Index (modified). R&D informs us that they have developed a new mood stabilizer called [name pending review by inter-service group committee] that, in preliminary Infrared testing, has a 42% survival rate. I am also informed it has a new, minty flavor. We therefore recommend dosing of all participants with [name pending review by inter-service group committee] as the seminar goes forward.
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Dec 4, 2020 22:30
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TK_Nyarlathotep posted:INCOMING TRANSMISSION God, when was this published? It feels like it must've been put out alongside one of the more exceptionally bad editions of Paranoia that just did not get the mood of the setting.
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Dec 4, 2020 23:45
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PeterWeller posted:Yeah, Pondsmith's source text isn't Neuromancer or Islands in the Net. It's Hard Wired, which is very much at the trashy end of the cyberpunk spectrum. Right. I think Pondsmith has something to say along the lines of cyberpunk and is not going 'wow cool guns and cyborgs' but he absolutely thought those guns and cyborgs looked cool.
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Dec 4, 2020 23:51
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Rockopolis posted:I know you are referring to Bubblegum Crisis, but it being the other kind of Boomer also works. As for Bubblegum Crisis Stephenls is correct. The original 8 OAVs are really worth seeing. The main unique thing going on is that the Boomers have some kind of assimilation/absorption business going on which is not generally present in most cyberpunk, but I think this was probably a leaning towards the transcendent stuff in things like Neuromancer and Schismatrix.
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Dec 4, 2020 23:54
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Cyberpunk is the result of Pondsmith being torn between two very different creative influences. On the one hand, he's always wanted Cyberpunk to draw heavily from Hard Wired and the like, hence the emphasis he always places in the text on having gritty street-level campaigns with cheap, fast death. But at the same time, he's an anime nerd to the core, and he really loves Bubblegum Crisis and Ghost in the Shell and Akira and the rest, and ends up working elements of those into the game (power armour, full-body cyborg conversions, really cool bikes and guns). But the two tones and themes clash pretty heavily, and there's really no way to resolve the disconnect between the two short of awkwardly working in some sort of escape hatch that ends up undercutting the themes somewhere along the way. Also yes, the original Bubblegum Crisis OVA is loving great, but the anime remake from the late 90s is kinda bad.
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Dec 5, 2020 00:02
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My favorite weird quirk of CP's rules is how Empathy is the critical stat for determining how much cyberwear you could jam into your body without uncontrollably flipping out. So if you are a corporation looking for subjects to be maximally cybered up as your ruthless elite combat storm troops, the last thing you want is a bunch of gung-ho hard asses - you should be selecting for sensitive, sympathetic, poetic souls with lots of friends and a tendency to adopt adorable puppies.
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Dec 5, 2020 00:16
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Nessus posted:You know this would even be a way in a like skirmish minis game that you could distinguish between the Freedom Boomer Oorahs and the AD Police-but-probably-not-police. The good guys run on batteries (reliable but low density) or possibly Mr. Fusion (incredibly good, presumably rare) while the Freedoomers get gas tanks, which are much larger capacity than the batteries but also have numerous side effects, including the risk of fire and explosion. I think in the original, the assimilation tech was just the one boomer in the first episode and then maybe a few specific boomers later who'd been kitted out with safer versions of it? Ironically in the remake it really is a feature of all boomer tech.
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Dec 5, 2020 00:20
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FMguru posted:My favorite weird quirk of CP's rules is how Empathy is the critical stat for determining how much cyberwear you could jam into your body without uncontrollably flipping out. So if you are a corporation looking for subjects to be maximally cybered up as your ruthless elite combat storm troops, the last thing you want is a bunch of gung-ho hard asses - you should be selecting for sensitive, sympathetic, poetic souls with lots of friends and a tendency to adopt adorable puppies. I'd actually love to see a cyberpunk game that had something like cyberpsychosis paired with Delta Green's rules for bonds. A game about clinging to human connections and emotional intimacy in the face of dehumanization and objectification at the hands of a rapacious capitalist world order. It wouldn't be anything like Cyberpunk 2013/2020/RED, but it'd be cool all the same.
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Dec 5, 2020 00:23
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Stephenls posted:I think in the original, the assimilation tech was just the one boomer in the first episode and then maybe a few specific boomers later who'd been kitted out with safer versions of it?
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Dec 5, 2020 00:26
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Pussy Cartel posted:I'd actually love to see a cyberpunk game that had something like cyberpsychosis paired with Delta Green's rules for bonds. A game about clinging to human connections and emotional intimacy in the face of dehumanization and objectification at the hands of a rapacious capitalist world order. Good news: one of the bits of the Red Markets review I have written in my head is how its stress mechanics do exactly that and what a good basis for a cyberpunk game Profit is.
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Dec 5, 2020 00:33
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 Cyberpunk RED, Part 6: Overkill I already covered the basics of initiative, movement, and actions in the last post, so I'm just going to dive right into the meat of the combat chapter. Ranged weapons are pretty straightforward. As combat-relevant stats go, they've got damage, rate of fire, magazine size, hands required, and firing modes (which can be single or automatic.) Ranged combat is a simple roll versus a DV determined by a handy chart, unless the target has a REF of 8 or higher, in which case they can choose to dodge, turning it into an opposed roll instead. Autofire is simpler than in past editions; it costs 10 rounds and the damage is equal to 2d6 x the amount by which you beat the DV for hitting the target. Suppressive fire, on the other hand, also consumes 10 rounds, but instead of simply doing damage it forces everyone within about 25 meters to make an opposed Concentration vs. Autofire check; failure means they have to run for cover. I actually really like this, because I've played too many crunchy games that make suppressive fire useless beyond possibly hitting enemies with stray bullets.  Shotgun shells and explosives get their own rules. Shells other than slugs work by making a roll against a pre-set DV and then automatically hitting everyone in a short cone in front of you if successful. Explosives, on the other hand, automatically hit everyone in the 10m blast radius; failing the attack roll means the explosive was off-target and lands somewhere else in a 10m radius of the original target. Melee weapons are even simpler than ranged; they get damage, rate of fire, and number of hands. Attacks are made with opposed rolls. One thing melee weapons have over ranged weapons is that they ignore half of the victim's armour. Bare-hand attacks do damage based on your BODY and whether or not you have cyberarms, and do not get to ignore half of the defender's armour. However, brawling can also be used for grabs, chokes, and throws. Martial arts are treated pretty similarly, but have their own (better) scale for damage, ignore half the defender's armour, and get various special moves divided into different styles. The book only offers four styles: Aikido, karate, judo, and taekwondo. Simple rules are given for handling damage from fire, drowning, suffocation, electrocution, exposure, falling, radiation, and poisons and drugs (which are simply divided into mild, strong, and deadly.) As for soaking damage, RED offers cover, shields, and armour. Cover is broken up into 2m squares and has an HP stat that has to be depleted before you can be hit. Cover is also rated as either thin (meaning it might be possible to move it) and thick (not happening unless you have superhuman strength.) Shields are basically treated like portable cover. On the topic of shields, though: quote:We all knew it would come to this. If you are already the Attacker in a Grapple, you can use the Action to "equip" the defender as a Human Shield.  Armour has only two stats: stopping power (SP) and an armour penalty. The armour's SP is deducted from incoming attacks, and the armour penalty (if there is one) is deducted from your REF, DEX, and MOVE. Armour is also ablative; every time damage manages to bleed through your armour, its SP is reduced by 1 until it's repaired. If it hits 0, the armour falls apart. Wounds are handled simply; at less than full HP you're lightly wounded, at half HP or less you're considered seriously wounded, and at 1 HP or less you're mortally wounded. Dying only happens if you fail a death save at 1 HP or less. That said, while characers are a bit harder to kill with straight up damage than in past editions, they've still got crits to worry about. Any time a damage roll has two or more 6s in it, the target suffers a critical hit to the location that was hit (Cyberpunk RED only has two locations: body and head.) Taking a crit does an additional 5 damage on top of whatever nasty effect you get from it, ranging from dismembered limbs and damaged organs to broken bones, collapsed lungs, and concussions. At mortally wounded every attack is considered an automatic crit. As for dying, death saves are made every turn once you're mortally wounded, and they get progressively harder for each one you make without treatment. Failure means death.  Vehicles are rated according to SDP, seats, combat speed, and narrative speed. SDP is the vehicle's HP, and vehicles are toast as soon as they run out of SDP. Vehicles also have weak points that can be attacked for Finally, we have reputation. Characters start with 0 rep by default, and gain rep whenever a GM feels like they've done something worthy of it. Rep goes up to 10, and is used in facedowns with other characters, which are opposed COOL + rep checks. The loser either backs down or takes a -2 to all actions against the winner until they manage to beat them at least once. Overall, I'd personally say the combat rules are an improvement over the old ones. Simpler and more game-y, but also a lot more playable for most gaming groups. Next time: Netrunning
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Dec 5, 2020 01:13
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"Here, just hold still and I'll have that tooth out real quick."
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Dec 5, 2020 01:49
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Looks more like she's giving him a really close shave.
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Dec 5, 2020 01:51
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and just incredibly bored with it.
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Dec 5, 2020 01:53
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I have this hypothesis that the two things that matter most in art are poses and facial expressions. If you can get those right, people will forgive most other flaws in your work. And if you can't get them right, your poo poo will look ridiculous no matter how high fidelity it is.
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Dec 5, 2020 02:04
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SkyeAuroline posted:It's fantastic that way. Not every mechanic in the game is necessarily good, but it's one of the few games where I can pull any random rule and go "okay, so that's how it's reinforcing the core themes" and understand immediately why it's there.  Oh "No Budget, No Buy", the optional rule nobody ever wants to run with but everyone agrees is very thematically appropriate and solid for a horror game, you rascal you.
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Dec 5, 2020 02:10
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mellonbread posted:I have this hypothesis that the two things that matter most in art are poses and facial expressions. If you can get those right, people will forgive most other flaws in your work. And if you can't get them right, your poo poo will look ridiculous no matter how high fidelity it is. They're the two things that humans are best at discerning. Messing up either one leads to an unappealing image.
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Dec 5, 2020 02:36
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 Red Markets: A Game of Economic Horror Part 2: The (Un)Death of History; or, The Part Where We (Poorly) Talk About Economics  4chan is still alive and well, even in the apocalypse. Pictured: Natalie “Gnat” Delle, narrator of History of the Crash, and one of the main operators of the post-Crash internet. A quick preface note: Red Markets' setting is long, dense, and frankly poorly written. I'm not doing a deep dive into every single paragraph here; you'll get the tone without the headache. Ultimately the setting is a kind of dumb contrivance to make the system work, and to allow for several author tracts to be shoved in the players' faces. Americans, this is all going to be very familiar. The entire setting section of this game, both parts, is written in-character, and so naturally Gnat starts us off with a little background on why even write a history lecture in-character. Credit where it’s due, even if Stokes and company hammer on the points pretty hard, these sections do a good job of painting the setting through broad notes. In the span of a single page with minimal direct acknowledgements of any of this, they allude to Taker missions (the lifeblood of the game), the bad blood between the Recession (the East) and the Loss (the West), the lovely conditions even the “free” that you’re aspiring to join are in, the level of societal failure in the Recession (from this single page alone, it’s a propagandized hell at direct odds with Loss survivors that can’t even teach its children and leaves refugees living in ghettos), and establishes our central narrator cast. Not bad for a story about finding an abandoned kid in a tree. So because of how badly education has failed, Gnat puts up an official record of what happened. Convenient for us as players; if only the same conciseness stuck around with the main text. Hit some personal history for Gnat, and we reach… The Failed State Everything leading up to the Crash itself falls into this section of the book. “The Failed State” is a mixture of modern-day political tirade and setting-building, and it’s the peak of Stokes’ preachy parts. Way, way too much of it, even for me. The Recession government wants to keep past America held up as a golden age to return to, and to blame all the problems on zombies that were more of a straw on the camel’s back. As a counter, we get treated to an overview of exactly how much more hosed Red Markets!Earth was than we were. The Crash came after global warming cracked a 3-degree rise, natural disasters spiked, and famine and housing crises swept the globe. Fertile ground for political fracturing; refugee crises, mass killings, political extremism on the rise (it gets mentioned on both sides, but the right managed success and the left… fell to infighting and self-destruction), and increased militarization of police to the point of “missile batteries on sports stadiums” and cops looking like Judge Dredd cosplayers. For extra points, the Internet basically collapsed, and journalism with it. We’re really setting up some fantastic groundwork worldwide! There’s notes made that a few powers survived the Crash mostly successfully, Scandinavians among them (this gets followed up on as a whole section later, but Scandinavia is the only one acknowledged). It gets chalked up to “green energy” here. But this is an American game, so we need more America, and you know what that means with this setting, I’m guessing. Education loan defaults skyrocket, economy collapses on the back of that alone, and… we get President Hunter, who is going to come up a lot, because he’s RM’s personal Reagan. Privatize the loan business, no bailouts, “business can do everything”. Red Markets really likes calling out right-wingers (and boomers), and that continues just fine into the collapse of workers’ rights and continued wage theft, the bolstering of the gig economy to stop dissent (“it’s hard to start a revolution on a full stomach” is acknowledged directly)... and every pension fund collapses at once to really wreck things. The Crash gets acknowledged as maybe a lesser loss of life than actually letting the economic collapse go on unchecked. Okay, half of the country is an abandoned wasteland and the other half is in slum conditions, I’m pretty sure that’s where this was headed anyway and adding zombies into the mix sure didn’t help. But sure, a zombie apocalypse is an improvement. Whatever you say.  America also gives us the first sample of the real art quality you can expect from this game. It’s… not ideal. Frankly, these two sections are much less “setting information” and more “personal diatribe”; they’re rarely going to come up for the average character. They’re just an extended acknowledgement and critique of all of the real-world issues that get extended forward. I’d normally just advise skipping over this block because it just doesn’t matter all that much, anyone who’s going to play Red Markets is sufficiently plugged in to know all this already, it’s just putting it in black and white. But, there’s good news in this messy section: what did science do to save us? The “Desperate Innovation” subsection is really long on account of explaining every single thing going on with Ubiq, the future internet run by balloon drone-hosted servers. Why balloons? Because balloons make it a miracle network. Gnat as narrator runs the Ubiq network, so of course it gets talked about a ton (to reinforce why I’m not covering every paragraph, Ubiq’s background is 9 tangentially-relevant-at-best pages long - it’s one of the longest single subsections in either setting chapter, and it’s longer than many of the full sections). This is another case of “it doesn’t actually matter all that much at all” aside from establishing backing for a couple pieces of equipment later, so to cut it much shorter, the big technical developments:
So, that’s everything leading up to the Crash itself. The world was already going to hell, so a zombie apocalypse was naturally the cap. At least it makes 2020 look nice. This chapter doesn’t compress well, but it’s frankly a chapter you don’t really need by the time you get to equipment and the GM section. The actual implications for Takers and for the GM are all covered in other sections again and more directly, without waxing poetic about the drat balloon Internet. Next time, History of the Crash pt. 2, or: I promised you zombies, I promise they’re coming!
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Dec 5, 2020 02:48
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Thanks for the story summary. I've played a few games of Red Markets but I don't think anyone except the GM read that section of the book. I think if Caleb just had a little more faith in his own writing, he wouldn't need to write so much backstory. Most of this stuff comes through in the gameplay pretty well, without the need for an extended lore filibuster.
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Dec 5, 2020 03:54
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I am normally 100% opposed to starting an RPG with fiction, and while Red Markets opens with like 100 pages of fiction, I loved every bit of it. I was immediately drawn in by the fact that it is written in-character and Gnat makes for an excellent cynical narrator. Taking the time to properly set up the biggest causes of the crash and delve into the economic and political woes of the pre-zombie world really helped me get into the setting, and its all relevant for understanding the particulars of the carrion economy that you'll be engaging in during play. I suppose it helps that I largely agree with the diatribe, but I found it to be excellent worldbuilding. I recently re-read the game while considering running a campaign of it and seeing that intro through the lens of 2020 is very different from before.
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Dec 5, 2020 03:56
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Pussy Cartel posted:I'd actually love to see a cyberpunk game that had something like cyberpsychosis paired with Delta Green's rules for bonds. A game about clinging to human connections and emotional intimacy in the face of dehumanization and objectification at the hands of a rapacious capitalist world order. I think this would be interesting and explore some themes I think are neat to have in cyberpunk-y fiction, but I can't stop thinking about the sheer comedy of someone going "Egads! Replacing my arm with a prosthetic with a machine gun in it has strained my relationship with my wife!"
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Dec 5, 2020 03:58
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mellonbread posted:Thanks for the story summary. I've played a few games of Red Markets but I don't think anyone except the GM read that section of the book. I have bad news. That's, uh, not nearly the story summarized. That's 17 pages' worth out of 170 or so; the prologue to the story. Fortunately after this it gets more interesting. I'm still going to try to not take an obnoxiously long time on it, because you said it well: the gameplay carries all the themes real well without all this needing to spell it out. LatwPIAT posted:I think this would be interesting and explore some themes I think are neat to have in cyberpunk-y fiction, but I can't stop thinking about the sheer comedy of someone going "Egads! Replacing my arm with a prosthetic with a machine gun in it has strained my relationship with my wife!" Ah yes, the good old Girlfriend Paradox of Resistance engine games, played in reverse.
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Dec 5, 2020 03:59
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LatwPIAT posted:I think this would be interesting and explore some themes I think are neat to have in cyberpunk-y fiction, but I can't stop thinking about the sheer comedy of someone going "Egads! Replacing my arm with a prosthetic with a machine gun in it has strained my relationship with my wife!" Signed, Jacked in Jo'burg.
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Dec 5, 2020 04:03
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I've got a prosthetic limb and it annoys me how these game designers always get it wrong. Yes, of course, we know that the human soul is evenly distributed throughout the body and the loss of my foot decreased my empathy by about 8%. But, and this is the thing they always miss, I now cry whenever I see pictures or videos of inanimate objects with googly eyes being threatened with physical violence. This needs to be accounted for in any game design.
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Dec 5, 2020 04:14
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It's nice to know there's an opposite number to Hic Something Latin Dragons out there.
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Dec 5, 2020 04:28
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Bieeanshee posted:It's nice to know there's an opposite number to Hic Something Latin Dragons out there. "Sunt". Hate the game but Latin gonna Latin. Nessus posted:Dear Sylia, my wife and I have both obtained integral firearms in our cyberarms. However, we did not get matching calibers and it is causing strain due to the obviously logistical factors - but more importantly, our arguments over which are best are now both far more personal and just a smidge more threatening. While it was exciting the first time, it's getting old: What should we do? O I remember that. I miss you, Anne.
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Dec 5, 2020 05:10
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LatwPIAT posted:I think this would be interesting and explore some themes I think are neat to have in cyberpunk-y fiction, but I can't stop thinking about the sheer comedy of someone going "Egads! Replacing my arm with a prosthetic with a machine gun in it has strained my relationship with my wife!" "Look I just think it's really funny to scare the neighbours by firing my cybergun over their heads when they're too loud, I don't get why she's so mad about all this!"
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Dec 5, 2020 05:33
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Epicurius posted:To: TK_Nyarlathotep-V-SEP To: Epicurius-V-HOS From: TK_Nyarlathotep-V-SEP Subject: Re:Re: New Seminar Material Glorious Daycycle, Friend Epicurius, We've been processing and reviewing your concerns and have discovered that, despite everything, decrease of productivity is still within acceptable drop parameters - just barely, so we'll keep your concerns in mind and look to make the seminar materials more actively engaging. Regarding the mood decrease, that was a major concern while developing the production materials. The garish art alone had a negative effect on some of our chief viewing officers, with a notable 17.6% uptick in willing reports for termination. We'll attempt to modify the program accordingly to reduce discomfort and happiness reduction, and administer as much [name pending review by inter-service group committee] as is safely permissible. PurpleXVI posted:God, when was this published? It feels like it must've been put out alongside one of the more exceptionally bad editions of Paranoia that just did not get the mood of the setting. Oh it's real bad and it only gets moreso from here. I remember attempting to read it years back and skimming because it is just a DRASTIC disconnect from the Paranoia I know and love. Even if utilizing the Straight variant from XP it's still got a lot of stupid incongruities.
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Dec 5, 2020 05:36
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Cyberpunk RED, Part 7: Technoir So for starters, the NET in RED has changed dramatically from how it was in 2013 and 2020. Not only was a lot of the infrastructure damaged or destroyed during the Fourth Corporate War proper, but what was left of it was then infested by a bunch of malicious AI programs designed by Rache Bartmoss, called RABIDs. The RABIDs not only trashed any data they came across, but were also more than happy to fry the brain of anyone they saw, and what's worse, the RABIDs have been multiplying. After a lot of failed attempts to kill off all of the RABIDs, Netwatch just gave up and shut down all links to the old NET. In its place are more local networks connected to one another by dedicated laser and land lines. That's not all, though. The familiar Neuromancer-style VR computer interfaces of the past are gone, replaced by a two pronged NET. Most users just experience a something almost exactly like the modern web, with hyperlinks, pages, embedded media, and the rest. And as for professionals and enthusiasts, well, they get to experience the NET in the form of local AR overlays that are coterminous with whatever site houses the architecture of the network or system they're engaging with. This AR interface is called Virtuality, which is a direct call-back to one of Mike Pondsmith's earlier games, Cybergeneration, which also featured an AR NET called Virtuality. Why did the VR NET of old get replaced by a more primitive hypertext and page-based NET? Well... Someone seriously wrote this in Cyberpunk RED and thought it was a good idea posted:About 2035, a new programming language was developed. This was designed to unify all the different operating systems that were still in existence. This new language is called META and could be used in place of everything from C++ to simple Phone apps. META is what the current NET works on. Because it is a patch language much like LINUX, META is not very good at supporting graphics, so the graphical interfaces of the old NET couldn't be supported. I didn't think I could be more offended by bad science after they tried to give cyberpsychosis a "scientific" explanation, and yet...here we are. Sometimes it's better not to try to come up with a lovely, half-assed technobabble explanation instead of just handwaving things. Anyway, interfacing with the NET in general requires a computer or phone, but if you want to work with the specific NET architectures on a more direct level, you need a cyberdeck (which is a specialized computer about the size of a pack of cards), and to use a cyberdeck you need a neural link and interface plugs. And since the NET is displayed in AR, you also need some way of seeing the AR overlay on meatspace, and that means a pair of Virtuality goggles at the very least, which allow you to see the AR overlay of the NET projected over the real world. No more jacking in and going limp as you do a run...unless of course you forgot your Virtuality goggles and don't either have cyberoptics with a built-in Virtuality interface, or Smart Glasses with the same. What's more, you can't jack into a system from afar anymore, either. Since most systems are no longer connected to larger networks, you need to reach a more local access point, and the access points themselves can only be connected to as long as you're within 6m of the AP. At any rate, cyberdecks have been greatly simplified from previous editions, and now only have a single stat, that being the quality of the deck, which determines how many "slots" it has. Slots themselves are used by both programs and upgrades, because this time around programs aren't software; instead, they're hardwired circuit boards that are physically installed in the deck.  Completely and totally inaccurate! Programs come in three types: boosters (which enhance your abilities in the NET), defenders (which protect you from harm in the NET), and attackers (which better enable you to damage or disrupt ICE, runners, and programs.) Each program has several stats, too: ATK is added to attacks made with it (if any), DEF is added to defense rolls made with it, and REZ acts as the program's HP. Existing programs in RED do everything you would expect; they can make you harder to detect, increase your speed, make it easier to crack passwords, reduce the damage you take from hostile programs and ICE, improve the damage you can deal to programs, runners, or ICE, force runners to log out, and more. Note that a program can only be used once per turn for each instance of it that's installed on the deck, and since netrunners get multiple actions per turn, there's a good reason to pack multiple copies of the same attack program. Also, a program isn't destroyed when its REZ hits 0; instead, it goes offline until the netrunner spends a few actions to bring it back up. Getting rid of a program permanently requires special programs, or ICE. And of course, since programs are no longer just software, you can't create backup copies on chips or other computers. Hardware upgrades are simpler, and there are only a few examples in the RED core. The more interesting options include a backup drive that can save programs that would otherwise have been destroyed, hardened circuitry to protect the deck from EMPs and the like, and insulated wiring that can prevent the deck from catching fire or setting its immediate surroundings on fire. Now as I mentioned in a previous post, netrunners get a number of NET actions each turn determined by their Interface, going as high as five actions each meat turn at 10. The list of NET actions is short: Jack In/Out, Use Interface, Activate/Deactivate Program, and Miscellaneous, which is a catch-all for any specialized function unique to a given system that the GM may have come up with. Unlike previous editions, movement no longer takes an action; netrunners can move as far as they like in a single turn without using any actions. Interface abilities are more detailed; they all require an Interface + 1d10 roll to use, an include things like using a basic attack on netrunners/programs/ICE, scanning for access points, mapping a system, manipulating devices connected to a given system, and so on. Yes, for the first time ever, you don't need to install a specific program just to do something like attack someone, crack a password, use cameras, or what have you; any netrunner can do all that by default. NET combat is pretty much like regular combat, using opposed rolls of Interface + ATK/DEF + 1d10, or just ATK/DEF + 1d10 in the case of black ICE. Now black ICE is the real kicker that any netrunner is going to have to worry about, and probably the main thing a netrunner's going to worry about having to fight in any given system. Black ICE acts like a souped up program with ATK, DEF, REZ, and a special stat called PER that's used to prevent netrunners from escaping. See, simply moving to another level of a system will just result in the ICE following them. If a netrunner really wants to get away without just logging out (which will cause the ICE to automatically get a free hit on them in the process), they can use an Interface ability called Slide that's opposed by the ICE's PER. If the netrunner succeeds, they can skip to the system level of their choice and the ICE will stop following. If you'd ever played Cyberpunk 2013 or 2020, you probably remember systems having maps that looked something like this:  That's no longer the case. Gone are the days of having to track a netrunner's movement on a special map from turn to turn. Instead, system architecture is now simplified into just being a series of abstract "floors" or "levels," which may or may not branch at one or more points. It starts with the Lobby (the first two floors), which tends to be lightly protected if at all, and then all floors below those are more challenging, and rated according to difficulty (from Basic all the way up to Advanced.) RED offers a couple of tables for GMs to roll against to randomly generate the floors of a given system, and whether or not branches exist and what they look like. The longest branch of a system has a "bottom" level at which a netrunner can leave a Virus that can alter the system in some way and persists after the netrunner leaves. Among the things that can inhabit the system are Demons. In previous editions, Demons were special programs also called compilers, that were artificially intelligent and could be loaded with other programs in order to both grant the Demon their functionality and also save on overall memory usage. In RED, Demons are instead a type of simple AI that simply exists to control specific real-world defense measures from inside the NET. They have REZ and an Interface score that can be used either to control the real world devices they're charged with, or to defend themselves with basic netrunner attacks. The defenses in question consist of either active defenses (various kinds of drones) or emplaced defenses (automated turrets and melee weapons emplacements.) And if you were hoping to be able to play something like a rigger in Cyberpunk RED with your own drones in combat, guess what, you can't unless you go through the trouble of buying or building an entire NET architecture of your own, and the active defenses in question...and then you've got the problem of somehow dragging around a massive computer system on missions, and somehow using drones that are specifically designed to only watch over a small area and attack intruders within it, as opposed to moving about under your direct orders. So much for keeping up with the times, guys!  Pictured: something you'll never get to play with in this game. The new netrunning rules are an overall improvement, and a whole hell of a lot more playable than in any previous edition, even if the specific lore justifications they gave for some of their changes are hilariously terrible. That said, at least for my part I feel a little disappointed just because my conception of a cyberpunk net was always shaped by Neuromancer. I like my classic cyberpunk settings to have a net that can be interfaced with in full VR, full of abstract geometries and glowing neon lattices and constructs. Losing all that in favour of some much more abstract and limited AR net feels like a real loss, and I get the impression that this is something that Mike Pondsmith is really personally committed to for creative reasons of some sort, given that he did the same thing back in Cybergeneration over twenty years ago. Next time: Medicine Pussy Cartel fucked around with this message at 00:05 on Dec 6, 2020 |
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Dec 5, 2020 05:36
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I'm hype for the Red Markets write-up. I considered running it for the first time over the summer. Definitely hits different these days.
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Dec 5, 2020 05:45
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Clever Moniker posted:I'm hype for the Red Markets write-up. I considered running it for the first time over the summer. Definitely hits different these days. It does hit different, and that's part of why I put it on my short-list to write up a review for; it's relevant/important in ways that it wasn't in 2017. Even though it's misery incarnate there's still something valuable to its "veneer-off" approach, acknowledging and taking on its issues head-on instead of putting them behind a veil and just alluding to them. You can't fix the whole system on your own, it will grind you down, but you know what the causes are and you can work to make the Loss a better place for you and the people you love, or break the cycle entirely. I think the intervening three years since RM was published have marked a shift that makes that attitude more mainstream, so to speak. Could just be me. And, well, the whole "global pandemic" thing. This weekend is going to be a nightmare for writing. Sunday or Monday for the next installment, it's written raw right now and I have to do some editing. I'm glad this is a game that interests people to see.
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Dec 5, 2020 05:56
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I've always wanted to know more about Red Markets and I can't wait to see more.
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Dec 5, 2020 06:10
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The Smoking Ruin Part 7: Overview of Acts 2 and 3 Acts 2 and 3 concern the trip to the Smoking Ruins and ends when the adventurers get into the place. Both are pretty short, but Act 2 is especially egregious in this regard, containing only a single encounter with a Dragonewt, a list of rumors to be found at Duck Point, and a list of three different routes the party can take to get to the Smoking Ruin. Only one of the routes will get the party there and back before the holy day, and it’s the one that goes directly there directly through Beast Valley, so why even bother offering the other two? Act three contains a few more encounters with Centaurs and Grazelanders as well as the optional encounter with Queen Leika’s riders. If we’re going by the 1 Act=1 session rule that the book seems to think is the case, these are the Acts that need some serious fleshing out to reach that lofty goal. This is where I think you should put those Wild Temple encounters, the path to the Smoking Ruins leads right by the temple itself. During act 1 the PC’s get to learn all about the Storm Age history of Korolstead, and Acts 2 and 3 the adventurers have the opportunity to learn the more modern history of the ruins from the people they meet. Every encounter they have with people along the way gives them a different perspective on the nonhuman wars of the early Third Age. Oh, and reminders of how dangerous it is. The adventure really does not want you to fight Vamargic, and even if the party does successfully they’ll probably take casualties. I know most RPG players and (and most RPG authors) don’t take warnings seriously, but Runequest is not your typical RPG. We’ll cover his stats when we get to the Ruins, but it’s good that the danger is being restated multiple times. In Duck Point, a passing Dragonewt will recognize Treya, as he is a former companion of Grandma Thinala. She must have had quite the bizarre party back in her day. Four Steps Blue is the dragonewts name, and he tells Treya that her grandmother’s spirit has been trapped inside the Smoking Ruin by the powerful magics there, and tells the whole party the secret of the Dragonewt ritual that’s burning the troll bodies. It gets garbled a bit in the translation from Auld Wyrmish to Tradetalk, but the key takeaway is that it is a ritual of “atonement.” They cursed Vamargics trolls for the sin of cannibalism with purifying flames that are meant to make the spirits consider their one-ness with the Troll Egg, which Dragonewts associate with Kygor Lytor. Of course, the ritual also cursed Braineater’s trolls, because Dragonewts aren’t great at distinguishing people from each other. Oh, and a helpful sidebar tells us that the dragonewts are really proud of themselves and think they did the trolls a favor by trapping them in the troll’s concept of hell. Dragonewts!  Four Steps Blue arrives in Duck Point Passing on into Beast Valley, a group of centaurs start shadowing the adventurers. They are peaceful and willing to talk, but don’t make the first move at communication. The book states that the worst outcome of the encounter is to not interact with them at all, so the GM should probably force a confrontation if the players aren’t willing. The “worst outcome is nothing happening” advice is very good for TTRPGs in general, and something I wish the writers of the Wild Temple had considered. Anyways, the centaurs know about the war with the trolls, and can give the party some of the details. If asked about the Smoking Ruins, they’ll ask the party not to disturb a monument to the centaur dead that they’ve left there, and can also be shown Dappled Light’s map to win their friendship. I’d like to take a brief diversion about some of the editing in the pdf: the thing is chock-full of typos. I think most of them got fixed for the print version, but for some reason they never updated the electronic pdf. Chaosium’s odd business practices aside, I bring this up now because of the fact that the leader of the centaurs, Dappled Light, has a listed ransom of 7,500L. To put things in perspective, Queen Leika Black-Spear is worth half that. King Ironhoof, demigod son of Orlanth, has a ransom of 5,000L. Either they should knock a 0 off that or that’s one valuable centauress. Lastly, when the party crosses over into the Grazelands, they encounter the Sun Lord Oxus of the Four Gifts Clan out for a ride with his wife and mother. While the Grazelanders have the least to say about the ruins, Oxus is one of my favorite NPCs in the book. He’s a very friendly and welcoming Sun Lord with a deep love of his wife Andretta and respect for women in general. Pretty rare for a Fire Runelord, I think he takes after the riders in Six Ages more than the Yelmites. They’re not very important for the adventure itself and during the encounter mostly just talk about their clan’s history, but me and my players liked them a lot, and one of the players wound up marrying into their family later on in the campaign. If you plan to keep adventuring in the South Wilds area, introducing Oxus and the Four Gifts clan now is a good idea, they make solid allies. The Four Gifts Clan is also the default clan for Grazelander adventurers in the core book, so we finally now get to know their current leadership as well as a short summary of their history here in an unrelated adventure book. Chapter 3 technically ends with the task of getting up the mesa and into the ruins, but I think I’ll cut that out and leave everything to do with the Smoking Ruins in Act 4. Next:Let’s see how the party does it, and take a quick detour to the Wild Temple along the way. Nanomashoes fucked around with this message at 09:26 on Dec 11, 2020 |
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Dec 5, 2020 06:16
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Stephenls posted:So... I think the thing about Mike Pondsmith's R.Talsorian's Cyberpunk 2017/2020/RED or whatever is that you are going to misunderstand its creative goals if you go into it thinking it is trying to be a cyberpunk game that emulates non-trashy cyberpunk. It's not trying to be Neuromancer. It's trying to be Robocop and any number of other trashy 80s cyberpunk B-movies and also gonzo 80s cyberpunk anime, and especially "Bubblegum Crisis, as misunderstood by someone who watched it out of order on third-generation bootleg fansub VHSs in a world where the only available Internet was mailing lists and USENET." While I don't disagree with your last paragraph, and have made the same "joking" description of Cyberpunk and Mike Pondsmith's clear old-school weeaboo inspirations, I would question one point. You really think Neuromancer is "less trashy" than Robocop? Or, to turn it around, that Robocop is "more trashy" than Neuromancer?
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Dec 5, 2020 06:22
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EimiYoshikawa posted:While I don't disagree with your last paragraph, and have made the same "joking" description of Cyberpunk and Mike Pondsmith's clear old-school weeaboo inspirations, I would question one point. For some definitions of those terms, yeah. To be clear, I'm not saying Neuromancer is better. I love all those works. But between Robocop and Neuromancer, only one of them has a Adam-West-can't-get-rid-of-the-bomb running gag involving a dude who's fallen into toxic waste and gets increasingly melty every time he stumbles back on screen before ultimately exploding like an overripe tomato upon getting hit by a car. (Which is great and I love it.) Stephenls fucked around with this message at 07:00 on Dec 5, 2020 |
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Dec 5, 2020 06:54
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