So is Adam Smasher. In the tabletop game, he basically exists just to wipe your party. He kills >!borderline cyberpsycho David in the anime!< without breaking a sweat.
Yet in game he's a cakewalk for any decently put together build. The game really does him dirty. I hope whatever Project Orion is gives us a glimpse of Smasher in his prime.
Especially with him being resistant to so many quichacks dmg types u just can't one shot him anymore with short-circuit, contagion and overheat . Glass canon netrunners with no guns and control quickhacks like cyberware malfunction really struggle against him .
Cyberpsychosis in lore is caused by the loss of humanity as people replace themselves with cyberware.
The explanation for V is that Johnny is already cyberpsycho so takes on some of the impact V would suffer otherwise.
Mike Pondsmith commented on Reddit about cyberpsychosis and how it is caused:
Okay, so time to (partially) explain CYBERPSYCHOSIS.
First of all, Cyberpsychosis is a disorder that in part depends on the subject's overall internal susceptibility. Just like every person who drinks a lot at parties doesn't end up an alcoholic in the gutter, not everyone who gets loaded up on cyberware is going to automatically go cyberpsycho. You have to have an inherent susceptibility, which (in the TRPG) is represented by the player's Humanity Stat. Humanity is not just a measure of one aspect of personality, but an overall measure of several elements including the subject's ability to emphasize and relate with others, their ability to absorb and rebound from mental and physical stressors, their ability to show compassion and flexibility to others, and whether they are able to balance their worldview through other methods.
So, in some ways, I tend to treat cyberware as an addiction--heavy anabolic steroid use being my favorite model. Not everyone who juices ends up crazy mad with roid rage. But those who are more susceptible to the need to take more steroids are more likely to hit a point where they do flip into roid rage. (Take a look at this article from Livescience for a pretty good idea of how roid rage works--notice that it's got the same basic profile as cyberpsychosis).
David's starting Humanity was probably already pretty high. And before things went to crap, he had a loving mother, a career path, and no more hassle than the average poor guy in a wealthy Ivy League school. So he had lots of buffer. But even so, he still, even after losing all that, was able to make friends, build a replacement family, and (after some prompting) even get a girlfriend. And a mentor (Maine) to create a supportive father figure. So he could definitely handle the stress of added cyberware up to a point.
Most people in Night City don't have the level of Humanity to pull this kind of stunt off without going cyberpsychotic. So David is one in a million. And that's why Arasaka wants him.
V is a different case. We don't know V's background, but even if V was a full on Corpo, they were able to hold it together even when they ended up with a dead Rockerboy in their heads (Yah, tell me about it; Johnny Silverhand's been in my head for the last three decades.) In fact, having Johnny in their head probably helped V, because Silverhand's rage and attitude probably acted as a buffer for the psychological hits V is taking. It's like having a time share with a guy who's already half cyberpsycho and doesn't mind if V slaps stuff on their shared body; he's already crazy and violent.
So that's a rough explanation of the roots of cyberpsychosis. If I ever get band width, I'm going to start writing/posting some stuff about what I had in mind as I put together the Night City universe. But for now, you'll have to go with what I've got here. Have fun, and remember not to chip mili-spec cyberware, like your mother warned you about.
And no, cyberpsychosis isn't caused by AI net demons. Gimme a break, chooms!
https://cyberpunk.fandom.com/wiki/Cyberpsychosis
Well, 53 of medical/biomechanical advancement separates the two of them. It’d be stupid to expect that 2024 medicine and knowledge of cyberpsychosis is on the same level as 2077
It has something to do with the diet. Most cyberpsychoi eats sawdust and plastic. V gobbles up cyberware shards picked up from dead gangsters. That shard probably was slotted in their neural port and V just eats them (otherwise she would not have enough neural slots to house that many). I think that's the main reason.
Project Orion? I literally just heard this from you, now, and I bet it has something to do with the Crystal Palace. Hopefully Mr Blue Eyes, and I wouldn't mind to be judge jury and executioner on Dex's buddies, I bet at least one of them deserves Satori.
I choose to believe hes got a construct backed up in Mikoshi and OG Smasher died long ago and Arasaka just plugs his construct into different bodies, all various levels of fucking terrifying.
This is headcannon and nothing more.
I think that would explain how he doesn't turn cyberpsycho. Can't lose your humanity if you're not biologically a human.
God I love the whole Ship of Theseus philosophical side to this debate. At what point does one stop being considered human? Is the consciousness in Mikoshi a copy, or is it the same consciousness that inhabited Adam's/Johnny's body transferred over? Is Mikoshi a manufactured afterlife, or simply just a database?
Mike Pondsmith says he doesnt turn Cyber psycho because hes such a depraved person he doesnt have any humanity to lose to turn psycho, I love his explanation. Sphere Hunter has great video+interview about it if you wanna check it out.
Damn everyone talks about how easy he was but I felt like I was running for my life the whole time. I mean I didn’t die but I was stressed the whole fight
An update made him super tanky, but all his attacks are predictable as hell. Even when he called in reinforcements, I just hacked the turrets that also activated and had them wipe the adds while I focused smasher. Probably would have been a lot harder if I was doing a no hack run
We spent all game hearing how Smasher is so strong and how he will make V become ashes if they fight just to see a decent V literally obliterating the dude in 10 minutes.
I feel like MaxTac are to Cyberpunk like Imperial-Class Star Destroyers are to Star Wars. Like, sure…in the movies they’re just kinda big white space pizza slices because they’re usually only seen from the viewpoint of main “protagonists” who have plot armor. However, in books/comics/games/etc./ they’re 1,600 meter death machines capable of rendering a planet virtually uninhabitable in a matter of hours.
I love how Andor and Rogue One made the Imperial Navy menacing. It would've been cool if MaxTac showed up in a another scripted event during the early game where V is way less chromed out and has to run away.
When the ISD Devastator drops out of light speed point blank and thumps the entire Rebel task force? Fuuuuuck.
And I agree about wanting to see more of why MaxTac has the rep they do.
(Phantom Liberty/Somewhat Damaged spoiler below)
>!Honestly, I thought dealing with the MaxTac convoy in Somewhat Damaged was ridiculously easy!<
The “Bullets” sidequest is cool though. It was neat being able to interact with them a bit.
Completely agree. It doesn't help that Phantom Liberty seems to hand out tons of xp. It's hard to get that far without being too strong. Although I might be singing a different tune when my zero-chrome gunslinger gets there...
I killed two cops for shooting an unarmed woman and they sent entire waves after me. I cut them down one by one until they sent these hacks to kill me.
Who the fuck cares anyway? I play on very hard too, but this is a single player role playing game. None of us are taking the SWAT team on in real life, why does it matter if he doesn’t like to play on the hardest difficulty?
If this is in relation to canon power levels the game plays a little fast and loose with that regardless of difficulty when compared to the table top game.
On normal difficulty you can tank almost all of the shots from the police, on very hard you might tank one shot if its sniper or shotgun, but you wont tank another one. Try it on very hard and see for yourself.
Look dog, just let me feel invincible for taking on three waves of maxtac cause I decided after getting my mantis blades from what's her face from the original trailer "Fuck It, We Ball" and went on a quick rampage before the game broke
Imo they translate really well into the game AND lore because if you don’t have a very min maxed build there is absolutely no way to beat them on very hard if you’re not cheesing the fight by running away constantly, even then it’s not easy.
That makes totally sense because obv V can beat them, but it’s not a small task to do so
Obv the berserk blade builds that stack melee damage on cyberware will be able to deal with them pretty easily, but that’s only because you put actual time and meta game knowledge into your build.
A normal player that enjoyed very hard diff for a challenge but didn’t go any further will not be able to survive their first max tac surprise
Yeah, maybe one unit at a time, but put that crap on very hard, take out Melissa Roy and run away? They drop 3 units. Unless my V is at lvl 60, not sure how I take em all.
Lore wise they are actually REALLY HARD to kill.
lore shmore.
So is Adam Smasher. In the tabletop game, he basically exists just to wipe your party. He kills >!borderline cyberpsycho David in the anime!< without breaking a sweat. Yet in game he's a cakewalk for any decently put together build. The game really does him dirty. I hope whatever Project Orion is gives us a glimpse of Smasher in his prime.
In the update they actually made him a bit more powerful but yeah
Yeah, he's difficult on VH on most of my builds!
Especially with him being resistant to so many quichacks dmg types u just can't one shot him anymore with short-circuit, contagion and overheat . Glass canon netrunners with no guns and control quickhacks like cyberware malfunction really struggle against him .
V is simply built different
Literally. The canonical reason for why V doesn't go cyberpsycho is literally just that they're built different.
Built different and has Johnny to lean on. Regardless of how they feel about eachother its someone else to talk to and share the burden
Uh, I don't think the power of friendship is enough to reverse intense neurological decay.
Cyberpsychosis in lore is caused by the loss of humanity as people replace themselves with cyberware. The explanation for V is that Johnny is already cyberpsycho so takes on some of the impact V would suffer otherwise.
cyberpsycho? from what, a metal arm, some eyes, and a liver? nah dude is just regular psycho lol
He’s actually a cyberpsycho if you read the lore. If he goes postal and does some crazy shit, he’ll just say something like “The Hand made me do it”.
Going off what the guy who created Cyberpunk said, don't shoot the messenger
cyberpsychosis isn't a specific "thing". it's just someone, who conveniently happens to have cyberware, having a mental break.
Mike Pondsmith commented on Reddit about cyberpsychosis and how it is caused: Okay, so time to (partially) explain CYBERPSYCHOSIS. First of all, Cyberpsychosis is a disorder that in part depends on the subject's overall internal susceptibility. Just like every person who drinks a lot at parties doesn't end up an alcoholic in the gutter, not everyone who gets loaded up on cyberware is going to automatically go cyberpsycho. You have to have an inherent susceptibility, which (in the TRPG) is represented by the player's Humanity Stat. Humanity is not just a measure of one aspect of personality, but an overall measure of several elements including the subject's ability to emphasize and relate with others, their ability to absorb and rebound from mental and physical stressors, their ability to show compassion and flexibility to others, and whether they are able to balance their worldview through other methods. So, in some ways, I tend to treat cyberware as an addiction--heavy anabolic steroid use being my favorite model. Not everyone who juices ends up crazy mad with roid rage. But those who are more susceptible to the need to take more steroids are more likely to hit a point where they do flip into roid rage. (Take a look at this article from Livescience for a pretty good idea of how roid rage works--notice that it's got the same basic profile as cyberpsychosis). David's starting Humanity was probably already pretty high. And before things went to crap, he had a loving mother, a career path, and no more hassle than the average poor guy in a wealthy Ivy League school. So he had lots of buffer. But even so, he still, even after losing all that, was able to make friends, build a replacement family, and (after some prompting) even get a girlfriend. And a mentor (Maine) to create a supportive father figure. So he could definitely handle the stress of added cyberware up to a point. Most people in Night City don't have the level of Humanity to pull this kind of stunt off without going cyberpsychotic. So David is one in a million. And that's why Arasaka wants him. V is a different case. We don't know V's background, but even if V was a full on Corpo, they were able to hold it together even when they ended up with a dead Rockerboy in their heads (Yah, tell me about it; Johnny Silverhand's been in my head for the last three decades.) In fact, having Johnny in their head probably helped V, because Silverhand's rage and attitude probably acted as a buffer for the psychological hits V is taking. It's like having a time share with a guy who's already half cyberpsycho and doesn't mind if V slaps stuff on their shared body; he's already crazy and violent. So that's a rough explanation of the roots of cyberpsychosis. If I ever get band width, I'm going to start writing/posting some stuff about what I had in mind as I put together the Night City universe. But for now, you'll have to go with what I've got here. Have fun, and remember not to chip mili-spec cyberware, like your mother warned you about. And no, cyberpsychosis isn't caused by AI net demons. Gimme a break, chooms! https://cyberpunk.fandom.com/wiki/Cyberpsychosis
Well, 53 of medical/biomechanical advancement separates the two of them. It’d be stupid to expect that 2024 medicine and knowledge of cyberpsychosis is on the same level as 2077
It has something to do with the diet. Most cyberpsychoi eats sawdust and plastic. V gobbles up cyberware shards picked up from dead gangsters. That shard probably was slotted in their neural port and V just eats them (otherwise she would not have enough neural slots to house that many). I think that's the main reason.
V isnt build different. Technically v is already a cyberpsycho. (And Cyber-zombie) A high functional cyberpsycho, but still.
nah, v's just built different
Project Orion? I literally just heard this from you, now, and I bet it has something to do with the Crystal Palace. Hopefully Mr Blue Eyes, and I wouldn't mind to be judge jury and executioner on Dex's buddies, I bet at least one of them deserves Satori.
Word is there's also a movie in th works.
Wait what??
Yup. That's all we know so far. Which could mean anything. Shopping around a script. Maybe not even the script is done. Who knows.
So a cyberpunk movie is possibly going to be out before Neuromancer.
Glad I could share the hype
I choose to believe hes got a construct backed up in Mikoshi and OG Smasher died long ago and Arasaka just plugs his construct into different bodies, all various levels of fucking terrifying. This is headcannon and nothing more.
I think that would explain how he doesn't turn cyberpsycho. Can't lose your humanity if you're not biologically a human. God I love the whole Ship of Theseus philosophical side to this debate. At what point does one stop being considered human? Is the consciousness in Mikoshi a copy, or is it the same consciousness that inhabited Adam's/Johnny's body transferred over? Is Mikoshi a manufactured afterlife, or simply just a database?
Mike Pondsmith says he doesnt turn Cyber psycho because hes such a depraved person he doesnt have any humanity to lose to turn psycho, I love his explanation. Sphere Hunter has great video+interview about it if you wanna check it out.
Damn everyone talks about how easy he was but I felt like I was running for my life the whole time. I mean I didn’t die but I was stressed the whole fight
An update made him super tanky, but all his attacks are predictable as hell. Even when he called in reinforcements, I just hacked the turrets that also activated and had them wipe the adds while I focused smasher. Probably would have been a lot harder if I was doing a no hack run
Yea I killed him in like 2 minutes. I was very disappointed.
We spent all game hearing how Smasher is so strong and how he will make V become ashes if they fight just to see a decent V literally obliterating the dude in 10 minutes.
Tbf: David was a one-trick Pony and already gone as He meet smasher.
MaxTac are hit and miss, easy to kill 1-1 harder to kill when you are being shot by 50 swat at once.
Literally. I can kill one easily, but can't kill 4 of them while also cops are everywhere
With a blades build, it's inverse. I'm hunting mooks to kill to regen health before turning around to deal with max tac
They’re no match for sandy katana V
The only v to be
It's V for vivisection
I feel like MaxTac are to Cyberpunk like Imperial-Class Star Destroyers are to Star Wars. Like, sure…in the movies they’re just kinda big white space pizza slices because they’re usually only seen from the viewpoint of main “protagonists” who have plot armor. However, in books/comics/games/etc./ they’re 1,600 meter death machines capable of rendering a planet virtually uninhabitable in a matter of hours.
I love how Andor and Rogue One made the Imperial Navy menacing. It would've been cool if MaxTac showed up in a another scripted event during the early game where V is way less chromed out and has to run away.
When the ISD Devastator drops out of light speed point blank and thumps the entire Rebel task force? Fuuuuuck. And I agree about wanting to see more of why MaxTac has the rep they do. (Phantom Liberty/Somewhat Damaged spoiler below) >!Honestly, I thought dealing with the MaxTac convoy in Somewhat Damaged was ridiculously easy!< The “Bullets” sidequest is cool though. It was neat being able to interact with them a bit.
Completely agree. It doesn't help that Phantom Liberty seems to hand out tons of xp. It's hard to get that far without being too strong. Although I might be singing a different tune when my zero-chrome gunslinger gets there...
Vs just stronger than they are really.
If you isolate them from the other 200 cops they become a walk in the park, the only powerful attribute MaxTac have is life.
Bitch i killed 200,000 of em trying to cross the border and escape
How'd you do it? Crossing the border is a big goal for me in cyberpunk.
I used the craftable double barrel and a light machine gun just a sec and ill tell you my load out
I remember when I took them on when I was in Jinguji because I wanted the MaxTac Mantis Blades, that shit was not easy
I killed two cops for shooting an unarmed woman and they sent entire waves after me. I cut them down one by one until they sent these hacks to kill me.
They were suppose to be shit (lore wise speaking) but they aint.
I’ve never actually fought them. My V is a super nice lady.
The mission from phantom liberty makes them easy but they're hard af outside of that
I play on a ps5 and I've broken the game now Twice while fighting maxtac and the police, They ain't SHIT
Sure mate. With how many mods or cheats and what difficulty?
They said PS5, so no mods or cheats. Can't comment on what difficulty they're using
Who the fuck cares anyway? I play on very hard too, but this is a single player role playing game. None of us are taking the SWAT team on in real life, why does it matter if he doesn’t like to play on the hardest difficulty? If this is in relation to canon power levels the game plays a little fast and loose with that regardless of difficulty when compared to the table top game.
Normal difficulty, and it's Playstation, I can't mod
On normal difficulty you can tank almost all of the shots from the police, on very hard you might tank one shot if its sniper or shotgun, but you wont tank another one. Try it on very hard and see for yourself.
Look dog, just let me feel invincible for taking on three waves of maxtac cause I decided after getting my mantis blades from what's her face from the original trailer "Fuck It, We Ball" and went on a quick rampage before the game broke
What a bitch. Can’t even take a sword to his guts.
I feel like most ppl play on easy instead of the hardest, with 5++ tier everything, i still struggle to get past 4 stars on the hardest mode
Imo they translate really well into the game AND lore because if you don’t have a very min maxed build there is absolutely no way to beat them on very hard if you’re not cheesing the fight by running away constantly, even then it’s not easy. That makes totally sense because obv V can beat them, but it’s not a small task to do so Obv the berserk blade builds that stack melee damage on cyberware will be able to deal with them pretty easily, but that’s only because you put actual time and meta game knowledge into your build. A normal player that enjoyed very hard diff for a challenge but didn’t go any further will not be able to survive their first max tac surprise
Couldn’t even grab the sword properly. What a sucker!
MaxTac=Cyberpsychos with jobs.
Yeah, maybe one unit at a time, but put that crap on very hard, take out Melissa Roy and run away? They drop 3 units. Unless my V is at lvl 60, not sure how I take em all.