Cyberpunk 2020, sell me on or off Options

[silva]

Hi there.

Old time Shadowrun player here, just recently managed to take a look at CP2020. I borrowed the core book and Night City Guide from a friend and finding it really interesting. (a bit teenager/over-the-top in tone, but interesting nonetheless)

So what would you say about it, and how does it compare to Shadowrun?

[Maelstrome]

ive been wondering about it myself but cant find a copy.

what kind of system is it?

[silva]

This cover got me interested...

http://img200.imageshack.us/my.php?image=nightcityguide.jpg

Just passing the eyes on the book, the system seems relatively simple (more simple than SR). But cant say anythng else aside of that,

[Chrysalis]

I've been playing Cyberpunk 2020 from 1996. Making me a bit younger than Phipps (old fogey), who also comes to the forums. CP2020 I still think system wise is one of the best, because it uses very simplistic rules. The tech in it is rather dated. It is also better at handling Transmetropolitan style straight-up cyberpunk.

[hobgoblin]

ive been wondering about it myself but cant find a copy.

http://store.fastcommerce.com/talsorian/ca...9939c74360.html

surprisingly cheap, i wonder if i should order myself the chromebooks as i have the main one sitting on a shelf...

still, i have a interest in the V3, even tho its more transhuman then cyberpunk (and have ruffled more then a few feathers with the old fan-guard).

bah, cant hurt to have both (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

[MKX]

I dunno where all my old CP2013 and 2020 stuff went, I do have a suspicion they where stolen at some point in the mid 90's... so, they where worth stealing I 'spose.

As for the setting, its very much an adult-oriented RPG, much like SR 4th Ed has caught up too and we see in its contemporary version Possibly a bit dated in some ways now and very 80's in a lot of its influences, sources and style, but think the last time I remember running it was back in about 1993 around the same time as SR1st Ed. Make no mistake, I converted tons of the cool stuff over from CP2020 and into SR 2nd Ed for good reason, there was a lot of crap in there, but some of it was just really cool crap and 'fluff' material to set the scene! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)
I think in some ways SR hasn't quite got the 'yes its crap, but I want to buy it' factor quite down pat yet.
It did have a very revolutionary for the time character creation and background setup which I thought was a redeeming quality to it as well, plenty of diversity in how you make them up.

Overall, I think it had a lot more pro's than con's, fairly easy to run really.
Its very much low-lifes with high-tech gear and sometimes very lethal.

[MYST1C]

So what would you say about it, and how does it compare to Shadowrun?

While i really like Shadowrun, Cyberpunk 2020 is my true love when it comes to RPGs. While some parts are dated (e.g. strict class-based character creation, unrealistic cyberspace representation - it was published in 1991 with most core rules and concepts going back to the first edition of 1988), it is simply a fun game!
The rules are simple (Stat + Skill + Modifiers + 1d10 vs. target number) and the game world is, IMHO, much more coherent than SR's.
Night City Sourcebook is one of the best RPG supplements I've ever read - it presents the whole city with maps and a block-by-block rundown of places, people and plot hooks! I generally like and recommend all of CP2020's location books: Home of the Brave (USA), Eurosource Plus (European Community), Pacific Rim (East Asia), Rache Bartmoss' Guide to the Net (Cyberspace), Deep Space (orbital habitats, space travel, moon bases)...

One CP2020 book I cannot recommend enough is Listen Up You Primitive Screwheads! The unexpurgated Cyberpunk Referee's Guide. A really great GM book usable for any Cyberpunk-style game ("Always remember: There are no stupid questions - just stupid people!").

My most important houserule is to replace the 1d10 mechanic with the 3d6 mechanic of Fuzion (a free universal system based on both CP2020's Interlock rules and the HERO system). CP2020's 1d10 mechanic has extremely high chances of critical success and failure (10% each)!

[Chrysalis]

I really recommend Wildside, Chromebooks 1&2, Solo of Fortune.

Wildside is the game book for playing any fixer.

CP v3.0 if it was printed on toilet paper would be done with used razor blades.

[Wesley Street]

Agreed. CP 3.0 is an embarrassment. Barbie dolls aside it looks like the person who did the book layouts never even took a design class in his life. It. Looks. Awful. If I owned the CP license I'd re-brand it as PostCyberPunk (all kinds of fun things you can do in marketing with the acronym "PCP") and take it from there.

Cyberpunk is a dated game... it's totally 80s, big-hair, Duran Duran, "oh that's totally grody dude" with class-based systems and die-rolling character trees for personality, history and even clothing style. It doesn't take much prep time to play, which is a plus if you're the kind of RPGer who just wants to get in and play and not fret over every little PC detail. But it's almost too simplistic if you've been playing Shadowrun. The tech is dated ("Whoah! Cell phones and fax machines!") and the sociology is dated ("Konichi-wa, you fear Japan, yes?") but it's a product of the late '80s so that's to be expected.

That said, the amount of detail one finds in a Cyberpunk sourcebook is the kind of thing that SR players whine on about what's missing in post 2nd edition Shadowrun. The Night City Sourcebook puts the original Seattle Sourcebook to shame in terms of sheer detail. In the intro, the author mentioned they actually put as much time into that one SB as they did into the CP2020 core book. The city core buildings are mapped out in 3D and everything from train schedules to museums to bars to police stations are listed in excruciating detail. But they also give you enough room to create your own spaces. The other sourcebooks are all solid as well. Their canned adventures had their good ones and their bad ones... there was even a cross-over adventure with Paranoia! So they did try to do different things with the property.

There's nothing that CP does that SR can't but it's definitely worth taking a look at if only to see where we've come from, what we can do right and what we can avoid in the future.

[Critias]

It's good stuff. Great stuff, even.

I'm not a huge fan of the core system -- mostly because I'm notorious for rolling a 1 on a d10 about half the time, and critical botches with firearms can suck -- but the STYLE of the books should be mandatory reading for anyone interested in playing or running a Shadowrun game, IMO. Where many think of Shadowrun as "D&D, plus guns," to me it's always been "CP:2020, plus elves."

[Chrysalis]

It's good stuff. Great stuff, even.

I'm not a huge fan of the core system -- mostly because I'm notorious for rolling a 1 on a d10 about half the time, and critical botches with firearms can suck -- but the STYLE of the books should be mandatory reading for anyone interested in playing or running a Shadowrun game, IMO. Where many think of Shadowrun as "D&D, plus guns," to me it's always been "CP:2020, plus elves."

I always thought SR was CP2020 with the AD&D Monster Manual.

Switch over to using 3d6 from Fuzion, it makes for better rolls thanks to the "bell curve". Although you lose the legendary roll 3 10s one after each other.

[Synner667]

So what would you say about it, and how does it compare to Shadowrun?

CP20xx is more of a "pure" cyberpunk - Neuromancer, Bladerunner, Robocop, Ghost in the Shell, etc - than the Urban Fantasy that was SR.
CP v3 is a very different fish, generally disliked for it's update of the setting.

In many ways, CP20xx's setting is what SR has finally caught up with [which is one reason why so many people spent so much time and effort converting CP20xx material to SR].

The spin off, Cybergeneration, is very much what SR v4 has become [Technomancers and overlayed reality, for instance]

Using the Fuzion rules, which the CP20xx rules evolved into, allows much, much more flexibility and many more options for characters than SR v4 can even begin to approach [helped by Talsorian having the HERO rules for a while].

[hobgoblin]

Agreed. CP 3.0 is an embarrassment. Barbie dolls aside it looks like the person who did the book layouts never even took a design class in his life. It. Looks. Awful. If I owned the CP license I'd re-brand it as PostCyberPunk (all kinds of fun things you can do in marketing with the acronym "PCP") and take it from there.

Checked the book and it was Mike himself that did the layout and design.

All in all it would not surprise me if v3 was a solo project done by Mike during free time, as he, his wife and Will Moss is the only 3 people listed as writers (they also wrote 2020, but there is 3 other people also listed, and the layout and design team have 5-6 other people besides Mike listed).

[nezumi]

Yes, the background stuff is fantastic. There are encyclopedias of gear (tons of cyber and weapons), maps and so on.

As for the mechanics, they actually sort of suck. They're very simple, but that doesn't mean they're fast. There are a lot of rolls, especially for autofire (where you roll for each bullet). The mechanics aren't very well balanced either. They went strongly for realism, at the expense of balance. CP is a VERY deadly game, and it's not hard for one or two characters to physically dominate everyone else. I will also say, in my experience, old CP players seem to be in a culture of their own, and it's hard to just jump in. Expect lots of house rules and pre-conceived notions on what is or is not acceptable, even if it's not written in the manuals.

I tried to get into CP. First I ran a game. It ended when one of the players, the one player who had played previously and who I asked if he'd help me understand the system, started complaining because someone else was wearing metalgear in public, and NO ONE would wear metalgear in public. Since it was a plot-important point, he killed the game.

The second one I played in someone else's game. He had some good house rules, like a cap on the primary class skill, but then made all sorts of assumptions about things like how the police operate which don't appear in any book and he wasn't willing to explain to me. At that point, I got frustrated and gave up.

If you do play, make sure it's with people you already know and aren't CP snobs. That's the lesson I came away with.

[Wesley Street]

Checked the book and it was Mike himself that did the layout and design.

All in all it would not surprise me if v3 was a solo project done by Mike during free time, as he, his wife and Will Moss is the only 3 people listed as writers (they also wrote 2020, but there is 3 other people also listed, and the layout and design team have 5-6 other people besides Mike listed).

That's so strange. It's not like there wouldn't have been gob-loads of student and professional layout artists willing to lend a hand. This is the kind of thing I would have jumped on in art school. It's unfortunate that Mike's attempted foray into graphic design destroyed what could have been a great re-launch.

[hobgoblin]

As for the mechanics, they actually sort of suck. They're very simple, but that doesn't mean they're fast. There are a lot of rolls, especially for autofire (where you roll for each bullet). The mechanics aren't very well balanced either. They went strongly for realism, at the expense of balance. CP is a VERY deadly game, and it's not hard for one or two characters to physically dominate everyone else. I will also say, in my experience, old CP players seem to be in a culture of their own, and it's hard to just jump in. Expect lots of house rules and pre-conceived notions on what is or is not acceptable, even if it's not written in the manuals.

Iirc, the combat system is claimed to be based off FBI ballistic tests, among other things. And the version used in 2020 have its lethality toned down compared to the 2013 edition...

[Chrysalis]

My issue with CP v3.0 was not the layout or the images, as much as it sucked. My issue was that the text was really 20 pages of poorly written material which was rehashed over 97 pages.

-Chrysalis

[hobgoblin]

heh, what can i say, the description of night city in v3 kinda reminded me of future gotham city from batman beyond...

that, and the edgerunner armor reminded me of the one interesting scene from the movie version of lost in space, where the soldier deploys his battle armor to hold of a threat while the rest gets to safety.

[silva]

Thanks everybody for the help.

So, taking a good look at the game, I got some worries..


1) Damage and Lethality.


I dont like rolling for damage (I think it bogs down combat). So, what would be a good fix value for a die? I thought about using 1d6= 3 or 4, the approx average.

And how does this modification stacks with the "halving armor" rule? I see the average armor (Armored/Kevlar Jacket) has rating 20 by default rules. Halving it would turn to 10.

I see also that a average heavy pistol do 3d6 damage, which woould go to 9 or 12 by my fixed damage rules.

So an average bulletproof protection would stop almost all damage from a average heavy pistol, putting him/her on a light damage level. While an unprotected target would take 9 or 12 points of damage, putting him/her on "critical" damage level.


2) Attributes/Stats

I notice the stats/attribs are: a) considerably unbalanced between themselves (Reflexes and Inteligence rules; Body and Appearance sucks); and b) pretty weird by themselves (come on, "Movement Allowance" ? Why not "Agility" or "Speed" already?). So I got this idea: swap the atributes to ones more balanced and more cool sounding...


Physical:
Body, Agility, Reflexes;


Mental:
Logic, Coolness, Empathy;


Special:
Cyber-Affinity, Edge; Appearance;


*Edge is just a better name for Luck; Cyber just a better name and concept for "Tech", encompassing not just an affinity for technology, but also the char natural tolerance to cyber-implants (maybe reducing or increasing humanity cost of implants? ); Logic is just a better name for inteligence; And Agility just a better name for "Movement Allowance" (oh my god, this must be the worst attribute name in a game (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif) ).

So, what you guys think?

[cREbralFIX]

RE: Lethality

Just max the damage on all firearms and explosives. Fully automatic fire is just nasty in the game. Characters tend to get splattered anyway, so who cares? Meat is disposable; adopt the Cyberpunk attitude!

Shadowrun can be a bit cheesy in some areas; my first scenario shocked a bunch of SR players (ugh...back in '92) as a CP2020 GM starting out in SR TWO. A few characters were completely hosed and spent quite a bit of time in the hospital.

Get the books for the background. Heck, use 'em as source material and play using the SR4 rules minus magic and critters.

[Synner667]

Oh.

So the whole point of your initial post was to work out how to convert from CP20xx to SR ??

As with any conversion, don't try and just do a direct conversion - it doesn't work.
The games are too different for a direct conversion, because they were designed to do things differently and for different 'feel'.

Determine equal values - what's an equivalent attribute value, an equivalent damage value, etc

[MYST1C]

Determine equal values - what's an equivalent attribute value, an equivalent damage value, etc

One very important difference between SR and CP2020 is the cyber system: CP2020 characters can take a lot more cyberware than SR characters, especially with a maxed Empathy stat.
Plus, "Humanity loss" in CP2020 is a purely psychological condition, not a mystic/metaphysical one like in SR. The core book already contained rules for completely restoring Humanity through therapy (requiring removal of all implants) while one of the chromebooks later offered rules for decreasing Humanity loss through therapy even while keeping your cyber.

After all, some of the full-body borgs had Humanity costs of dozens of d6s or even d10s when you could have at max 100 Humanity points (EMP 10 x 10)!

[nezumi]

Synner is precisely right. While there is nothing stopping you from pulling CP stuff over to SR (or tri-stat or whatever you want to use as mechanics; remember CP2020 basically had mechanics so they had somethign to pull together all of their cool things. Their motto is style over substance. The mechanics are completely secondary), do be aware that, well, they believe in style over substance. CP is NOT BALANCED.

There are a bazillion conversions already on the web for CP2020 -> Shadowrun. About 2/3rds are also not balanced (if you see any handheld weapons that do 12LN, run). I made a loooong list of stuff here on Dumpshock you are welcome to yoink, on the condition you tell me what works and what doesn't, so I can refine it. You are also welcome to do CP2020 freeform, or just resolve combat with a flip of a coin. It's completely in line with the world they've set up. Realize right now, CP2020 mechanics are voluntary, like something added after the fact to stick their stuff together. SR mechanics are not.

[Wesley Street]

My issue with CP v3.0 was not the layout or the images, as much as it sucked. My issue was that the text was really 20 pages of poorly written material which was rehashed over 97 pages.

It could have been the greatest thing since sliced bread but if the presentation looked like garbage, who would bother with reading it? Sounds to me like the ugly layouts save people from hashing through ugly rules. It's double ugly! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

[hobgoblin]

i knew i was a freak, but i didnt know how much of one until now...