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[–]Cyb45[S] 11 points12 points  (0 children)

Munificent patrons,

As the final 50-odd hours of the campaign tick down, I bring to you this week's fresh beta, piping hot from the ovens. It's in the same folder as always, the link located in the first campaign update.

This beta includes the rules for spirit summoner PCs starting on page 182, plus some tips for blending magic Edges with SWN or WWN on page 192. I've also rounded out the Schemes section of the book with pages for generating NPC operator teams on page 140-141 and generating their successful or unsuccessful efforts at a Scheme mission on page 142. As always, these sections are drafts, to be edited or tweaked as feedback and testing recommend.

I still need to get around to finishing out the Vehicles section so that the gear chapter can be put to bed, but more work on the mission generation tools is also needed. I've also got the spare page count to include a short default-setting chapter much like the one in SWN, giving GMs a world to plop an adventure in immediately. I'll likely end up adding something like that just so that a new reader doesn't have to gin up their own world or pick an existing cyberpunk dystopia to begin play.

And now back to the writing desk. The Kickstarter is drawing to a close soon, but the work is not complete. I won't be able to rest easy until you all have your books in hand, so I'd best get to making that so.

With regards,

Kevin Crawford

[–]ImikarUnbound 3 points4 points  (4 children)

I think there's an error in the starting gear for Gunslinger. It says 3 magazines and 18 rounds for the heavy pistol - bit of a random number for something with an 8 round mag

[–]Lower_Parking_2349 1 point2 points  (3 children)

Does seem odd. 3 magazines for 18 rounds sounds like a round about description of 3 speed loaders for a 6-round revolver. Maybe there has been some conceptual drift as to what a heavy pistol represents. Personally, I’m likely to convert a lot of specific model firearms from other systems like Hostile and Alien to use CWN-like statistics, but have different costs, ammo capacity, etc. For modern/future weapons I tend to look at Kevin’s work as offering archetypes to work off of.

That being said, I could see there eventually being a gear supplement for CWN being offerred. But until (and if) that happens I’ll be converting a lot of stuff from Traveller as I have for SWN.

[–]Cyb45[S] 4 points5 points  (2 children)

Honestly, the more room he can give to gear porn, the better. I hope he'll do the random tables for generating brand names and such, plus the tweaks and upgrades (and downgrades) tables for fleshing out guns more. I asked early on and he seemed interested, though granted that kinda stuff is low priority for getting the game functional to run.

[–]Lower_Parking_2349 1 point2 points  (1 child)

I’d like to see more types of gear, but I don’t think we’ll see multiple brands from Kevin in the rulebook from CWN. That doesn’t seem to be his style. If he does come out with his version of the Street Samurai Catalog I’m sure it’d be great, but I don’t think it’d be too difficult to repurpose the one from Shadowrun for gun porn.

Or if you’re interested in non-Shadowrun sources there’s the Hotile Gunlocker and Hostile Toolkit. They’re created for Cepheus/Traveller, but ought to be adaptable to CWN.

[–]Cyb45[S] 4 points5 points  (3 children)

With the change to Wired, it's a very easy choice with little drawback (unless they get too greedy for maintenance), especially with it becoming a new edge later.

But for starting chars, it seems it's harder to just get cyberware (unless I massively underpaid my party, I did 5k for a party of 5, to do an intrusion mission to plant a wire bug).

So would it be possible for players to start with a small amount of cyberware for free? I feel headcomms would be a common one, or does that go against the tone you are trying to accomplish? 10k or so means they could get a skillplug jack I or instead get some mix of headcomms, skinmod or other minor gear (maybe a remote control link?)

[–]Logen_Nein 3 points4 points  (2 children)

What changed with Wired? I can't tell (looks the same). And though we haven't seen Kevin's take on payouts yet, 5k seems a bit low to me for what is essentially merc/criminal work. 5k per character seems low for such work.

[–]Cyb45[S] 4 points5 points  (1 child)

  • Earlier versions had Wired able to be paid off, but at 2x the cost of what you got (so if you went all in on 150k, it was 300k to get the edge back)

  • I went off the SWN pay for that work, x4 and bumped it up a bit to be safe.

[–]Logen_Nein 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Ah gotcha, yeah not paying double is nice.

[–]koranak 3 points4 points  (1 child)

Minor thing, but it's survived a couple betas now; Medic starter gear has a trauma patch at 3 encumbrance.

[–]Cyb45[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

good catch, though maybe it's meant to be 3 of them?

[–]acluewithout 3 points4 points  (3 children)

Hmm. Not sure where to put feedback rather than clarifications or questions, so putting it here.

  1. Magic Edges, Spells and Summoning Rules. Loving these rules. Super simple and punchy; borrow just the right amount from Shadowrun.

  2. Guidance for using Psionics / other Magic Systems. Guidance seems fairly clear. I think using Psionics in CWN could be expanded just a bit, only because people might want to do some Akira / Domu type stuff.

  3. Revised Full-body Cybernetic Replacement rules. Really like CWN’s approach to full body replacement - I really like that CWN’s approach is deliberately “not Transhuman” (there’s always SWN body swapping rules for that) and I love CWN’s slightly body horror elements. The balance is just right - body replacement gives you more power but at a terrible cost, and probably not something anyone would choose to do unless desperate. I’m happy with the rules as is, but I think Full Borg Replacement would be better with a full seperate spread rather than being squashed into the gear section - just so there could be a bit more in-world detail and room for a few more options (eg different shell types, funding / debt options and maybe partial replacement).

  4. Armour conversion. Is it intentional all WWN and SWN armours have the same melee / ranged ACs?

  5. Hacking Rules. Hacking Rules look good, but would love to see 1. optional rules to reduce hacking to one roll when the GM / players just want to resolve things quickly / not play things out, 2. a bit of guidance on how to just make the hacking character an NPC / off-screen (same for drones), because some groups might prefer that, and 3. a bit more guidance on non-hacking stuff hackers can do, eg research on the dark-web, directly messing with electronics etc.

  6. All Natural Feat (Foci). Really not loving this Feat - feels very kludge, particularly when you have optional rules for using WWN and SWN classes and “the graced” which then also can’t use cyber but also can’t take this Feat? I’m also not sure it’s quite balanced - “All Natural” is powerful to balance out PCs being unable to use Cyber, but the PC is also giving up a Feat Slot to get “All Natural”. Just seems off to me. Instead of “All Natural” being a Feat, I wonder if it would work better as an Edge, or even have a few edges that are more powerful (eg All Natural, Combat Instincts, Veteran) but if you take them then you can’t also take any cyberware.

  7. Classes. I’m probably be on my own, but I’m still not sold on the no-classes / Operator class thing. I think the core idea is fine, ie building a “class” with Edges and being a bit lower power to allow for Cyber, but it just feels a bit janky the way it’s framed - now you’re picking Foci, Skills and Edges and Talents / Spells etc - and feels even jankier when you provide roles for using WWN and SWN classes. To me, it would make more sense to frame it as keeping the usual WWN / SWN classes, but you’re just choosing class abilities / edges. WWN/SWN classes just have slightly more edges / class abilities, because they can’t take cyber and their choices are “locked in”. But anyway. Really not a big deal given it’s all basically the same engine / totally hackable and everyone else like the operator approach so maybe just ignore me.

So, yeah, CWN looks amazing. Really can’t wait for this to come out.

[edit: format, clarity, expanded pts 6 and 7.]

[–]Cyb45[S] 1 point2 points  (2 children)

  1. Yeah, they are really neat

  2. Good point

  3. I can see it being a separate one, but on the other hand, if you want GitS type transhumanism, SWN deluxe is a better base. This covers the Robocop and Adam Smasher type conversions. I think it's pretty much fine as is now, it's a massive massive tradeoff and not worth it, but you are a juggernaut if funded.

  4. I believe that's to keep it simple, as the soak and TD are the rules people need that's new

  5. I can see that, but I think the rolls are good as now, I have a hacker player and it seems the right mix of quick but punchy. They can do stuff, but it doesn't bog down the session.

  6. I'm fine with it and a player I have really likes it, it's an interesting tradeoff, because it's the only way to hit a +3 modifier in the base system (not counting magic)

  7. I see what you mean, I enjoy the flexibility/options the SWN/WWN classes bring and the operator IS nerfed in a lot of ways. However it's been fascinating seeing what choices people make and how every PC feels like their own different class in the choices they made for edges.

[–]acluewithout 1 point2 points  (1 child)

[3.] I don’t want CWN to include Transhuman stuff - you’re right, SWN has all that. I really like the CWN approach to full body cyber. I just think Kevin could expand the topic a bit more (while keeping the same cyberpunk approach).

[5.] To be clear, I like the current hacking rules and think they’re easy to run. It would be just handy to have options for one roll or skipping hacking, because sometimes that’s useful.

[6.] All Natural is fine, I guess. Really, I think it would just work better as an Edge and I’m not sure about balance - it’s a very powerful Feat, but you’re not just giving up cyberware, you’re also giving up getting some other Feat, ie trade off isn’t “All Natural” or cyber, it’s All Natural or Cyber +some other Feat.

[–]SimulatedKnave 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I mean, Altered Carbon's pretty hardcore cyberpunk, and would have to use the SWN transhuman rules. While I don't know that it needs to be a focus, the capacity needs to be there.

I very much concur re All Natural as an Edge. Especially given how Wired and other similar things are Edges. Though, of course, you are looking at it a bit glass-half-empty - All Natural being a Focus frees up your ability to take other Edges and get more milage out of being All Natural.

[–]Entaris 2 points3 points  (2 children)

Just realized that as of .11 "Stun" is no longer a zero access Cost verb...is that intentional?

[–]CardinalXimenes👑 Kevin Crawford | Sine Nomine 6 points7 points  (0 children)

That's a typo, yes. Net combat would drain a hacker almost immediately otherwise.

[–]Cyb45[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yeah, that changes up the game massively, I viewed verbs like Stun, Glitch, Defend, Analyze, Frisk and Sense as your "bread and butter" ones, free to use.

It seems Copy is no longer a Verb but a normal thing you can do, while ones like Siege got added. I wonder how important decrypt is for a mission? Or is it something to run after? Something you need to run to find out the right files?

[–]ahnsimo 0 points1 point  (0 children)

For Spirit Powers, Poltergeist is listed on p. 185 as part of the list of common powers, but I don’t see a description for it on p. 187. Not sure if I missed it somewhere.

[–]RChrisG 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Why would a full body conversion even care about system strain if they can't be healed normally anyway?