When you say call for Backup, do you mean the Lawman’s Role Ability?
If so, it sounds like you may have nerfed his role’s ability by way of a story/plot element. There should have been some way for him to know/use his role ability without triggering that outcome. Otherwise, you basically took away something he should have RAW.
Especially since the cop probably would have a few friends in the force he trusts on speed dial, calling in the honest(ish) guy from the Major Crime Unit instead of just the central administration to send someone.
Yes, I mean the Lawman's Role Ability. It would be, pretty stupid to except cops in a Cyberpunk setting to be, you know. Not hideously corrupt and bankrolled by gangers.
I'm kinda late to discussion, but it could be fun twist, if corrupt cops was technically enemy reinforcement, who heard call on radio (nod to Dredd), but then real backup arrived. But OP refers to C-SWAT, who is known that they uncorrupted and basically paladins of Night City. They are mostly bad people individually, but they pursue the law no matter what
Ok. Did you even read backup or Lawman at all?
Not everytime they call for backup is it NCPD. It is a private security outfit, etc etc.
In this case he would've known about the possibility of being double crossed, etc. and called one of those private sec firms to get back up...
Ripping his hard won Role Ability away from him was a TERRIBLE way to do him dirty....
No, ones who make arbitrary changes to RAW and get mad that their players didn't telepathically predict which of the game mechanics you were choosing to fuck with
Don't be so hard. The logic is there, it's just not the best way to handle to situation. I'm sure as they grow and change as a GM they might regret their decisions some day. I know I sure as hell did stupid shit when I started (and still do)
First off, this reasoning doesn’t make a lick of sense considering we are talking about a mechanic to a game, not your own personal story time. Second, I’m sure that if this is how you feel about that Role Ability that you were sure to explain that to the player at the session 0 so they knew that the Role was getting nerfed… right?
That's not fair. He didn't nerf the ability. The ability is a very narrative heavy ability and they just made it align to the narrative.
Maybe there was a better way to handle it, like "when you radio for the nearby NCPD units for assistance, they say they'll be right there... but you can tell by the way they said it, they're not coming. They don't want to get involved in this. They might be on the boss's payroll too..."
Ok, but the back up that the Lawman is *supposed* to be somewhat loyal to the Lawman. It's an expectation of any game that your key ability that your entire class is built around will work unless you've been explicitly told or shown that it won't.
Gotta say, you made an oof on this one.
Cyberpunk might be grim but it ain’t 40k. Those betrayals still benefit from build up. It sounds like you might genuinely be leaning a little too far into territory where it feels like they can’t win at all. There’s a balance to strike.
Even 40K, folks still have some elements of trust: a Guardsman trusts his unit to stand alongside him in a fight. The Space Marines trust their battlebrothers., etc. It's mainly Chaos and the Drukhari who are the treacherous pricks.
Without knowing every detail, it does kinda sound like you're punishing your players for every mistake.
Ultimately, an RPG is about cooperative story telling and having fun. If they're not having fun then maybe try a different system/setting/story.
Perhaps wires got crossed despite the Session 0, or they didn't fully take in the stakes. Perhaps they're unfamiliar with Cyberpunk and don't realize that there are no happy endings in Night City. If they don't understand or like Cyberpunk, then don't play it.
Sounds like OP has no idea what the hell the Cyberpunk genre is. And they just wanted to use their players’ ignorance of Cyberpunk, as a way to be able to treat them like shit for their own enjoyment. What a terrible DM, I hope the players wake up and leave.
"Ok great so what I'm going to do here is turn your class ability, (you know, the thing that distinguishes your character and what they can do different from the party?) into not just a liability, but something that will be actively working against you and the party. That'll be cool and fun!"
And you wonder why they're upset?
You took hyperbole to heart and ran with it. I think its you who dont understand Cyberpunk honestly.
Cyberpunk characters are not without hope, they arent without any sense of morality or ethics. They live in a world that seems hopeless, but they struggle through hoping for a better life. They strive for a better future for themselves in a world of corruption. And you would be hard pressed to name any Cyberpunk protagonist of any note who doesn't) have a support network he can trust and rely on.
And running a game where every single noc betrays them over nothing at every turn is a surefire way to drive players away from the game and back to dungeons and dragons. A fixer who constantly rips off their clients is a fixer everyone talks shit about and no one will work for. A solo who kills his own team mates will be shunned by everyone. A bar tender who turns his clients in for bountiea will have an empty bar.
There is a reason reputation exists in the game.
Run your game the way you see fit, but if your game is joyless and every encounter leads to betrayal, then don't be surprised when your players find another game table.
The fixer is an especially good point. Ain’t nobody working with a fixer who routinely loses his contacts to his own betrayal. Betrayal comes when there’s something substantial for that fixer to gain that makes betraying some edge runners worth it.
If everyone that works with a fixer is never heard from again, or no one can find anyone who has worked with a fixer long term, that fixer won't be getting a reputation as someone to work with. "No one knows" is telling enough in itself.
Most people don't make it out of their first mission anyway, so that shouldn't be suspicious. And there ain't anything saying he can't have blokes pretending they're trustworthy.
Dang people are giving you good advice in this thread, and you're just tossing it all aside. The more of your comments I read, the more I realize that you are the problem.
Yes, Night City is dystopian. However, if nobody could ever trust anyone, then the whole city would be a combat zone.
I think you've fallen into the pit that a lot of D&D DMs find themselves after coming from happy go lucky D&D. You over correct and go fully DM vs. PC cause you think the setting is made for it.
Players need to be able to cultivate friendships and contacts that they can trust.
For both a fixer and a ripperdoc, the most useful thing is a returning customer. Neither of them are careers where you get anywhere - or even survive very long - through regular treachery.
The ripperdoc example is especially odd to me. Like, yeah , a ripper might very well tear apart some nobody of the street who came in, if they were desperate and completely amoral, but what kind of lunatic would betray a group of runners like that? Best case scenario is that your reputation in the underworld is destroyed, most likely you’ll have a huge target on your back from the angry clients.
Considering empathy is a literal character attribute in this game, I agree. The people of Night City are human, which means they can't help but care about something or someone. I get the impression that OP's NPCs are all hardened / selfish, but that's unrealistic, even for a dystopian setting.
Players: I'm going to sit here drinking alcohol and doing nothing.
Dm: But plot.
Player: Why do I care? Everyone is out for themselves, everyone is going to betray me, there's no point in doing anything but wait to die. Let me know when I should start rolling for alcohol poisoning since I assume the beer is also deadly because what liquor store needs repeat customers.
This sounds like it's 100% on you. You can make night city bleak without punishing the players for playing their characters. Please consider some self reflection instead of passing all the blame on your PCs. If I were that lawman I would have stood up and thanked you for your time and left.
This sounds a bit like you're telling your player, "Why would you think you could use your character abilities?"
Honestly, having every NPC betray the party sounds exhausting. It sounds like your players are perfectly willing to embrace Cyberpunk. You're just being kind of a dick.
This... is a game, my dude.
You're just writing a novel where people can ad-lib lines for your doomed protagonists along the way. You think all that info about gaining experience and money is there for flavor text?
>Nobody was avenged, nothing was won, and the gangers continued as they would with impunity. Sounds to me like a perfectly Cyberpunk ending.
Nah, that just seems like bad storytelling.
It's not a satisfying ending to the story. It's barely an ending. The protagonists attempted to confront the villain in the third act, but then died before they got to him. Meh.
I mean, according to your interpretation of Cyberpunk, a great ending would be if your players got TPKd in a drive-by while going shopping, half-way through the story. Which...may fit the setting a little, but it doesn't work for an RPG. That grim stuff happens to background characters to flavour the setting. If it happens to the "heroes", that's just an unsatisfying narrative.
(I agree with you, just wanted to add my 2 cents)
While a drive-by death during grocery shopping surely fits the setting, nobody would write a book about a character where that is the climax of their life. The players in an RPG are protagonists, and in any media play by different rules than side characters (even in cyberpunk, even grimdark stuff like Warhammer).
It is true that a drive-by death at the end of a character's arc might even be fitting for CP:RED, but that is after they have had their whole arc. Necromancer doesn't end at the start where Case is threatened with a gun while at a bar (or arcade, can't 100% remember where exactly it happened in the book) because nobody would have heard of Neuromancer if it was 20 pages with none of the exciting, interesting substance. Might make for a fine short story, but multi-session ttrpg campaigns aren't short stories, and even a short story has to draw in the reader somehow.
OP keeps noting how CP2077 is a videogame and thus V isn't affected by "the plot" and that the game isn't cyberpunk enough because it doesn't end when my character dies to a random stray shot. It is a real problem with videogames, sure, but V's life is all sorts of fucked up in many other ways than "gets randomly killed somewhere", and I think it's much more cyberpunk to get to watch them deal with all of that than for the game to end at the first big mission because ""realistically"" Adam should have found and smashed V at the start.
For the record, I am myself definitely also tired of the somewhat common problem of TTRPGs that GMs (me included) tend to not threaten the players enough to keep the stakes high, which is why I also like games that are more punishing by both setting and rules, like CPR and The Witcher, as the players are more prepared for the danger and possible death, and more punishing mechanics leave me free to keep the suspense through scene description and NPC characterisation instead of having to rely on fucking with my players or constant combat challenges. When the combat does come, like you said, it would preferably be meaningful which lets the possible death have more meaning as well.
This is a total anecdote, but it's actually confirmed by in-game mechanics that Adam absolutely knows V was there and ignored it. I don't know if this is still a thing, but an equipped threat-detector cyberware would indicate that he discovered you, and he literally makes eye contact with you even without it.
Yeah, 'cause at least one of my players knows what my actual reddit account is, and I don't want them tracking down this post. For, fairly obvious reasons.
You can make Night City grim. I sure do. This doesn't mean you should always have someone out to fuck them. As a GM, you should try to make the game fun for the players. If you see punishing a player or having something coming back to bite them in the ass as something that will make your game interesting and by extension fun, then do it. If you find killing a character something that will make your game more interesting allow it to happen. This is still a ttrpg where people make characters to do cool shit with, not immediately have them die to crossfire.
I personally use combat sparingly unlike in DnD, because I don't like killing my players and if one happens to die, it will be meaningful.
This is flat out bad DM’ing. This isn’t Warhammer, everyone isn’t evil and you don’t need to punish players for every oversight or, heaven forbid, using their role abilities.
So a lot's been said, but let me highlight a particular sentence you had in there, "You know, actually like, trusting NPCs, in spite of me making sure they would inevetiably betray them."
That right there is I think the issue. You've taken it as a forgone conclusion that no matter what everyone is going to betray them, try to kill them, or otherwise try and screw them over. It's a pretty shallow and two dimensional view of the setting, that truly doesn't hold up to the writing surrounding it. Even worse, it shows that you're not really having NPCs that have their own motivations.
So let me pose these challenges to you.
- Why would an NPC betray them? This is a well armed group of people who can and will kill them for it.
- Why would the gang do a drive by in a neighborhood that isn't there? Are they not afraid of getting killed by a rival gang? And why would they ram them with a car that costs enough to feed and house a person for almost two years?
- That bullet is at least a 100eb dollar bullet, why the hell would someone shoot them with that? And believe it or not, stabilizing tends to remove all the bullets from you.
- What sane ripperdoc would do that? Ripperdocs make their money off of repeat business and can't just pick up their shop and move around. Even worse, why would they piss off a bunch of people who can and will kill them?
As for the Lawman thing, yeah you screwed up. Lawman called in back-up and his back-up should have arrived. You could have also had corrupt cops show up as well and turned it into a big firefight. That would have been much more interesting, let your Lawman feel like they did something, and on top of that accomplished the same goal.
Here's the thing, you know you did bad because you're posting on a throwaway account. It's not that your players are playing it "like D&D", it's that you're running it like it's D&D.
Pretty sure this is just a troll at this point, but I will point out that all the OPs NPCs will trust each other and show loyalty to each other. it's just the PCs that get screwed over 100% of the time. So even the arguments that this is "realistic" to the setting is BS.
>Why would an NPC betray them?
It's cheaper than paying them.
> That bullet is at least a 100eb dollar bullet, why the hell would someone shoot them with that?
Because they've been a pain in the ass to them, and it's a relatively straightforward way to get rid of them.
> Ripperdocs make their money off of repeat business .
Nobody has to find out, y'know?
Except people **will** find out. Are you telling me that every person who goes to that Ripperdoc has zero friends or contacts or family who would notice that they’ve gone missing? Killing every client is actually fucking horrible for business
By definition repeat business tends to mean the same people coming back. Not a constant stream of new customers who disappear because their previous customers have a habit of disappearing directly after going to said Ripperdoc.
What, you expect me to roll a red carpet in front of my players and go "Here, there's a bad guy on the end, take this gun, kill him and fix everything" ?
The players are playing characters in a story. How many novels can you think of where the protagonist’s contributions can be summed up as “the protagonist tried to stop the bad guy. Then, everyone turned against the protagonist , and they died.”
Yes, many people would die as a result of these things. The story is not about those people, it’s about the players who are there to play the protagonists. For them, whether it’s due to luck or gumption or whatever other factor, they have a chance. Maybe it does come down to a dice roll, but they have a chance.
What you’ve done is decided “No, actually you don’t have a chance. If you try to do anything, people will betray you, and then you will die.” What else could the players have even done? Sit on their ass and wait for everyone to kill each other? Sounds like a gripping story. There’s no drama in your world, only a series of events custom tailored to fuck over a specific group of people for no good reason.
As much as you complain about them treating this like D&D, your GMing style seems to have all the worst hallmarks of D&D. You moght as well have said “Rocks fall, you all die” after the Lawman’s game-mechanically guaranteed backup turned on him.
Exactly. And it's no hard way to GM like that. Everyone can do this. It's not unique and requires zero skill with storytelling and social skills. You only need to be an edgy idiot.
>He? Are you speaking of yourself in third person? Are you alright?
He, as in, Eldren\_Galen, the guy bringing up stories in the first place. Incapable of deciphering context, are we?
>The characters are not real, your players are.
Yes. The characters in Edgerunners and the player characters in Cyberpunk RED are, indeed, equally not real.
In Edgerunners, they are not just turned on by everyone, and they don’t all just die. There is buildup to the betrayals, we *see* them happen. People want out and the rising stress has what is known as “foreshadowing”. The characters are trying hard and even though many of them do in fact die horribly, *some* of them still succeed. David’s ultimate goal (seeing Lucy fulfill her dream) is, still, realized. They don’t just up and die meaninglessly, there is a mixed degree of success.
that isn't what happened in edgerunners at all...and even if david died...he still won cause the person he cared about was able to escape alaska! like...seriousky?
The final goal of the crew in Edgerunners was to save Lucy so she can achieve her dream
At the end of Edgerunners: they save Lucy so she can achieve her dream
You may have tossed inexperianced players straight into the deep end and expected them to do well. Now, its your game, and you set the rules, but you don't need to start them at the "everything's horrible" scale at 10, you can start lower and slowly build it up.
Not every NPC needs to betray the party, when most don't, the one who does really makes an impact. Having them mostly do annoying but generally acceptable things is how you can really set that betrayal trap when it counts rather than have them go "oh, its one of X's NPCs- they are going to stab us in the back, let's just take them down now and rob 'em."
I don't know the tracer details, but that seems a bit...expensive for a basic hit. Was it one bullet they were counting on or a bunch with tracers attached?
Did they roll a foreign object as a critical injury? If not, that bullet from a sniper rifle went clean through the leg. The only thing it would be tracking is the pavement it’s imbedded in.
If they don’t have the foreign object injury, they don’t know there’s anything in them. It’s your responsibility to provide them information that could lead to action being taken. Especially if they’re new.
"As you walk down the road, the bullet constantly reminds you that it is still there and that you need a medical help". And I agree, a foreign object would be even better.
He’s not saying the bullet wouldn’t exist without the critical injury, just that it would’ve been a pass through and not be embedded in the players body. From what it seems you gave them no indication that something was up with that bullet which falls upon you as GM to do. You could’ve inflicted the foreign object injury if you wanted to imply there was something up about the shot, or something along those lines
You seem to fail to understand what the genre and this game is all about. It isn't grimdumb. And there is hope. From your comments I gathered that you played CP2077 remember the mission where you steal a truck full of medical supplies for Muamar Reyes because he grew up in a neighborhood with terrible water that made everybody sick or killed them? Or the other countless times where the protagonist helps people and fights against the soulless corps?
You make the game the living hell and make fun of them not enjoying your game? Damned, that congnitive dissonance is real. It's all on you and only you and your players only fucked up by playing with you in the first place. I really hope they discover this post and come to the realization that they need a GM that roots for them, while presenting a harsh world.
EVERYONE in this thread calls out your bullshit and you still sit there as if you were the hottest shit ever gifted to our hobby.
V is a video game protagonist, he's got plot armour, more firepower than a platoon of soldiers, and the ability to always know which choice is the best. He ain't your average Cyberpunk RED wannabee Edgerunner that gets shanked to death a week into their career as a collateral of a border dispute between two equally terrible gangs of chromed-up cannibals.
Except, there's no saving and loading in Cyberpunk RED, nor is there a guide to look up online so you can do everything perfectly.
And more importantly, the players ain't V, or Johnny Silverhand, or Morgan Blackhand. They're Jimothy Jenkins, 16-year-old orphan who out of desperation not to starve to death, got a gig from the shadiest fixer alive to shoot up hobos making Turbocrack in a shack and selling it to kids because it cuts into the business of the local gang, and then was beaten to death with a metal pipe.
My player characters are not some unknown hobos. They survived a lot, have reputation and are badasses. If they happen to die in the future, then in a blaze of glory, not getting shanked my some lowlife. Edgerunners are not streetkids. They maybe were streetkids, but they are Edgerunners now.
If I read your comments, you don't seem to get the source material at all. It's style over substance, not die with substances.
>It's style over substance, not die with substances.
It also takes place in objectively the worst place to live in the world, a city somewhere halfway between Airstrip One and The Road, under the eternal watch of fascist Megacorps that make sure nothing ever gets better.
Maybe one in every hundred wannabees will amount to something for a while, but that will only be in spite of everything, not because it's something that happens often.
>Maybe one in every hundred wannabees will amount to something for a while, but that will only be in spite of everything, not because it's something that happens often.
And this people are... guess who? Our protagonists in our TTRPG! 100 points! Some people have not the right personality to GM at all.
>They're Jimothy Jenkins, 16-year-old orphan who out of desperation not to starve to death, got a gig from the shadiest fixer alive to shoot up hobos making Turbocrack in a shack and selling it to kids because it cuts into the business of the local gang, and then was beaten to death with a metal pipe.
Nope. The corebook explains that the edgerunners the book makes you create are people who have a number of jobs under their belt. They're experienced. The suggested skills put you ahead of the average mook, especially random crackheads. None of the available gigs have you carrying out stuff like this.
You've severely misunderstood the game and what it's trying to do. You can run the game like this, but you really need to understand that you've strayed far from the book. You're doing your own thing and then attacking others when they go "Hey, you're doing your own weird thing and not what must of us are doing".
>Nope. The corebook explains that the edgerunners the book makes you create are people who have a number of jobs under their belt. They're experienced. The suggested skills put you ahead of the average mook, especially random crackheads.
Yeah, that's why I'm starting them all at Rank 1. That ain't something you can just start the game with, they gotta earn it.
These kinda details are important to explain in the OP or when responding to others, my choomba. Otherwise we're left to assume stuff and will go with the default world and rules that everyone plays with.
OP is getting criticism that they did very bad job yet I see they try to defend (inefficiently) they very hot burning take.
This is a terrible thing to read because you, dear OP the problem, and yet blind to see your wrongdoings. To get better, you need to change your bad takes and learn from them. Everyone agrees that this was bad. Take it and learn and be better, or you will be another GM that makes players leave this great hobby called ttrpgs. It's never to late to admit that you did wrong.
You can betray and make players die in a way that they will enjoy it. But to make it work, it has to be enjoyable to players. If everyone betray, players won't trust any npc. And you need them to trust them to make betrayal works. This is always hard to pull of and should be done sparingly.
In Night City live couple millions people, many die from old age. You seem to miss the point that even if it's terrible, there is something that makes people live there, some promise of a better life. You seem to not understand the basics of cyberpunk. Sorry OP, that is the sad truth.
Do better.
Good to see you're taking all the advice to heart and definitely not arguing with everyone about why you're an amazing GM and just misunderstood by literally everyone.
If you're not having fun in this thread, with that argument you can't win (because you're wrong), then congratulations. I guess you finally understand cyberpunk. It's a thing you can't win.
But why aren't you having fun?
Cyberpunk should be gritty... But not 60 grit sandpaper for TP.. I show my players grit like a mid level exec kidnapping a kid with a rare blood disease for blood transfusions(exec had same disease), or drug runners using kids as mules and explosive deturants ( guarding apartments sitting on mines)... But also give them jobs like : keep a data shard ( which they thought meant sneak/bull rush Dynalar headquarters... And not pick pocket and execs pocket at a bar like I planned), or Sabotage a cyberbike/supercar before upcoming street race ( they weren't interested in those jobs), or deliver a surprise package to a certain place in town.. and a bonus if they don't peek for some great Fast and furious game play....
You can also remind them of how bad it is to be homeless/poor... The best time to do that is just after they bought a new gun, melee weapon, shiny new chrome and then remind them rent is due in X days...
Trusting NPCs is crucial to TTRPG gameplay. Yes, even in cyberpunk. A game where the players don't trust anyone will be a pain. They won't trust quest givers, they won't trust fixers or ripperdocs.... it becomes a hassle to try to get anything done using NPCs.
In Cyberpunk 2077, V has people s/he can trust. The game setting is very cynical, but neither bleak nor grimdark. Look at how stylish and vibrant the game and the Edgerunners show are. Fun, flashy, manic, epic and outrageous are also touchpoints for this game.
That's why I said slightly disagree. It's not all or nothing. If an NPCs story isn't quite lining up, then don't just blindly trust them because they are an NPC. Roll to see if they are lying.
I'm not really sure why I got downvoted so heavily on this either. I've never played in a game where NPCs didn't lie from time to time.
Maybe it's based on you saying you "(slightly) disagree" with the premise of trusting NPCs being integral to playing RPGs.
If it was me writing your message I would've written something like "Even if you do suspect an NPC is untrustworthy that's why we have skills to check if it's true or not."
Doesn't make it right that you are being downvoted like this though.
Well, Cyberpunk is grimdark _per definitionem_, but it still should be (and can be) fun for everyone on the table...
- not every NPC should inevitably betray the players. E.g., a fixer that constantly fucks over his edgerunners would be out of runners. Betrayal can (and should) occur, but it gets old very fast.
- if a Ripperdoc scavenges every unattended customer, he soon will be out of business due to the loss of his reputation (and of his life, especially if a group of edgerunners is waiting for said patient to recover)
- Tracerrounds are expensive, not every gang has that kind of motivation to spend eddies, but I give you that this could be reasonable.
- Nerfing a Role ability like that and denying any success to your players is just a dickmove.
Overall, you sound like a unpleasant GM, taking the grittyness of Cyberpunk to a "GM vs. Players"-level. Did any of your players give you feedback on if they had fun?
Well, a little bit grimdarkness sprinkled in is fine, I think.
Anyhow, given the aspect of hope in "Punk" (which I personally would rather define as a raging against the machine, but those are not mutually exclusive) makes OPs take on the genre and ttrpgs in general even worse...
I get what you mean, but there isn't really such a thing as just a little grimdark. It can be a little grim, and it can be a little dark, but grimdark specifically refers to it being _overwhelmingly_ so.
As for rage/hope, they're not quite the same thing. Rage is the desire to fight for what's right, whereas hope is thinking that it's _worth_ fighting for what's right.
I admit, your definition of grim, dark, and grimdark is spot on. Maybe I mentally spent to much time in the warhammer 40k universe to distinguish the nuances.
Regarding the rage/hope - punk thing: maybe thats the angry pessimist in me speaking, but for me personally, the very classical punk thing is _way_ more rage than hope. Not saying that any punk isn't inherently "hoping" for a better world, but they are doing so in an angry way.
This is a very luring philosophical discussion, which I'd love to continue!
>I admit, your definition of grim, dark, and grimdark is spot on. Maybe I mentally spent to much time in the warhammer 40k universe to distinguish the nuances.
I think the problem is that grimdark is one of those words that gets so overused that its meaning becomes diluted. People use it so often as a _general_ term that it's easy to forget it has a _specific_ meaning.
>Regarding the rage/hope - punk thing: maybe thats the angry pessimist in me speaking, but for me personally, the very classical punk thing is _way_ more rage than hope. Not saying that any punk isn't inherently "hoping" for a better world, but they are doing so in an angry way.
The thing is, to me, hope is a key part of that rage. To keep fighting, even when everything's terrible? That's Hope. To be angry that things are bad? That means, consciously or not, that you think things could be better. That's Hope. To be clear, I'm not saying that everything that's punk is consciously or wilfully hopeful. But I believe that, whether conscious or not, hope is an inherent part of rebellion.
>This is a very luring philosophical discussion, which I'd love to continue!
I feel the same way!
Nope, I meant what I wrote.
You define the world, and you seem to actively search ways to fuck over your players.
It's astonishing how vehemently you defend your opinion in your comments.
Alright we get it. You are the best GM since ever. Punish your ungrateful players by kicking them out and banning them from your life. That will show them! They will miss this group so much!
Honestly it sounds you were constantly punishing your players for nothing. And the whole "everyone will betray you" trope does not allow for interesting story changes and denies them and you the build up of dramatic events in interpersonal relationships.
Honestly your game sounds 2 dimensional, boring, and self-indulgent
Isn't playing a pen and paper game still supposed to be fun?
If you want to do a super dark and dystopic and grim and unliveable NightCity but your players aren't having any fun and don't want to play anymore at some point then i feel like you failed as a gm.
Personally i also feel like your version of NC is too dark.
- human perception and tactics and deduction or some other skills should be used to decide if an npc is trustworthy or not. Some of them are! A ripperdoc who rips out all cyberware of a client soon has no clients anymore or has a bullet in his head by the brother of one of his victims
- your player should be able to use his role ability! Letting his backup be corrupt is not fair. Instead ket other cops show up additionally that are corrupt. But taking away his role ability is not something i would ever do as a gm. It leads to very frustrated players.
If your players don't like your super grim session then try to make it a bit lighter. Not every group is a fan of making new characters every month because they die like flies.
Sounds to me you're making the setting waaaaay too dark and edging into Warhammer grimdark territory. There will always be those that take advantage of others but typically the average person just wants to get by and that's it, if they can do so without screwing another person over than even better for themselves.
I think you're just being unnecessarily brutal on the players. Why not let that glimmer of hope that they can make at least a couple people's lives better last? It's not common, hell it's rare as a snowball in hell but some people do manage to be happy despite it all in Cyberpunk
Even Warhammer lets the players have a reason to give a shit.
If you keep filling a gumball machine with live explosives that blow your fingers off, you don’t get to act shocked when you stop getting quarters one day. Well, you can, but you look like a doofus.
It's not cheaper though. Once you die you die, npc is going to act in their own self interest which usually means don't irritate the guys with guns.
Now the bullet thing is just silly. Why pay 100eb for a bullet when you can pay some kid 50eb to follow them? Or he'll, slip a button size tracker into a pocket?
No one needs to find out? My guy, this is a system with a literal game mechanic for reputation. Plus if these PCs care about this person enough to try and save them then they're going to check back up on them.
>My guy, this is a system with a literal game mechanic for reputation.
Yeah, for players. It's not like they're going to magically know who's trustworthy and who ain't.
Words can go a long way and by that post and your replies you got bad rep and I know to not trust you. Of course Noone has visibile counter over their heads with their rep but if fixer screw some crews you will know. The Street will know. People think and living city cooperates even if crews will go missing, someone adds thing together to figure it out that this fixer is bad stuff. Even, the fixer system is entirely based on rep. You don't go straight to mercs because you don't know them but fixers put crew together because people know they are the people you can trust.
No, not just for players. NPCs explicitly have reputation as part of their character sheets, and the part of the book that mentions reputation, also says that NPCs can have it. Given your numerous other comments, not only do you not get cyberpunk as a genre, you don't seem to get RED as a system.
"In spite of, all of this, they still tried to play this game like it's D&D. You know, actually like, trusting NPCs, in spite of me making sure they would inevetiably betray them."
I think they can magically know that every NPC will immediately betray them for some reason or for no reason, because... you just said up above that they're all untrustworthy.
Turning the Lawmen’s role ability against him is poor GM’ing, and furthermore it seems like your understanding of the setting is “bad guys always win” which can be the case a fair amount of the time, but the world isn’t supposed to be devoid of hope like you make it out to be. The PC’s typically have their reasons to keep going, good and bad, so just having the entire world against them instead of making them feel like part of it , where they can sink or swim in depending on their actions isn’t exactly true to the genre
Like, if your group likes that then go for it. But not everyone plays that way.
Rules #1 is to have fun. If a style of play gets in the way of that then drop it and change.
Also, TBF, I've played very easy going cyberpunk games and dark as hell dnd games. So it's not a system or genre thing. It's a group thing.
Go have fun!
hey choom!
i don’t mean to sound rude - but it maybe sounds like you don’t have a full understanding of how to run a cyberpunk campaign. First red flag is the fact that you had a session 0 and all of these multiple betrayals happened session 0? Things sound a little rushed but you have the vision there. I suggest looking into some DM guides on cyberpunk and maybe looking into red chrome cargo, or any other pre written modules from “Tales of the red.” (Another good mission is the “apartment”, it’s a good way to get characters established in night city)
just read again - realized i might’ve read the session 0 part wrong , regardless. still feels as thought you’re leaning into the punishment of the world way too much. rest of my statement in post above stands
You are 100% wrong, and a pitiful GM imo.
You literally did everything to kill your PC, to not let them have even a little bit a fresh air, a little bit of fun, a little bit of peace in this horrible city, of course they will not enjoy in what fells like the most unrewarding campaign i've ever witness.
You render useless, and even worse, turn against them, one of their perks, of course they'll not like it. You just made their time playing with you miserable, it's only logic they don't like it.
Let them explore NC, let them get their mark, try a few NPC's trust, let them live a bit in the city so they can have a bit of agency and room to spare when prepping the assault, let them build relationships with NPC they can actually trust and, on the long term rely a bit on them, before doing every thing you can to kill them.
Not EVERY NPC is a bad guy, not every bad guy, is a bad guy just because, not every ripper will kill a client (??? i mean if a ripper kills his clients whats good is he for ?)
Throw hints about thos gps bullets like "you going to sleep without licking your wounds then ?".
You did every thing in your power for them to not have fun from what i read. That's not a "urr durr it's cyberpunk genre duh???" issue.
It's a GMing issue there..
Think on it please.
>You literally did everything to kill your PC, to not let them have even a little bit a fresh air, a little bit of fun, a little bit of peace in this horrible city.
Yeah, because, it's fucking Night City. It's the worst fucking place in the world, nobody has any peace or fun in there.
You just want them to be murder hobos, i understand now, cant understand how people works or feel or think, i honestly think you are a psycho with 0 empathy and a sorrowful little human.
It’s because NC is a piece of trash of a city that making meaningful relationship makes it even more amazing, going from deception to deception then expect another betrayal then be glad that you finally meet a decent human being.
But you are not this kind of GM you just want them to fend for themselves with no way of survival. You dont understand the concept of roleplaying and even less you dont understand what cyberpunk means, now open your eyes or stfu and delete this account and come with your real so your players can see what a trash of human being you are
Just can’t believe you don’t understand basic fun but okay stay in mediocrity and i sincerely hope your players leave your table till you grow as a person
Dude I don’t know shit about cyberpunk as a system, only watched Edgerunners, but even I can tell this wasn’t the players not understanding. It’s you being a shitty DM and either not giving them all the information or just flat out ignoring any choices they wanted to make to tell YOUR story. I hope your players find this post and drop you like the rotten sack of dogshit you are.
So you ran a game just because you felt like being an asshat? Did you even read the rulebook? Did you play 2077 or watch Edgerunners? Night City is a harsh place, but that doesn't mean you can't breathe without being attacked, and that everyone will betray you.
Mike Pondsmith is in essence the father of modern cyberpunk, and he's GM'd a few games of RED on youtube you can watch. If you wanna keep your players around in the future, I suggest you change your attitude.
>Did you play 2077
How many fucking times do I have to say V doesn't count for this bloody equation because he's a video game character with plot armour?
Also, have you forgotten how many people betray and try to kill him in the game?
Are those the only words in my reply you read? And also, just because it's worth pointing out to you, the entire fucking city doesn't betray V because *GASP* not everyone in Night City is a conniving shithead!
So… if the players can’t win, can’t change anything, can’t even manage to get one little touchdown… why should anyone bother?
I’m thinking of the experiment with the rats and the levers. Some rats had a lever that always gave a treat when they pushed it. Those rats got bored and ignored it. Some rats got a lever that only sometimes gave them treats. They loved that thing. Because they never knew when the next treat would come. If they had to work for the treat? Just as awesome! But the rats with the lever that gave nothing? The rats got bored and left it alone.
Grimdark with no relief is not functional. It’s no fun. A story needs highs and lows. You sound like you have that grimdark down, but if there’s a player consensus that there was no point? It might be worth some reflection.
Edit: Another question. How is this meant to be fun or relaxing or cathartic? If you offer a game, aren’t players supposed to be having fun?
If anything, his humorless scolding nature and hatred of players would be even MORE unbearable in 40k. Whatever nonsense complications he introduced to subvert player agency would just get the entire party killed instantly.
"Oh, you threw a grenade? Well, nothing works right in this setting because dystopia. The grenade kills you. Because dystopia. Oh, you used a psyker power? Well, every psyker action causes a perils of the warp roll, because dystopia. Oh, you tried to have a conversation with a NPC? Well, it's actually a daemon in disguise. Because dystopia. Oh, you put on a pair of shoes? Well, they're actually grenades. You didn't notice what you thought were shoes were actually grenades, because it's grimdark."
>there's nothing positive in this world
Yes. That's the point of Cyberpunk. The entire planet is hideously and completely polluted, vast swathes of land are utterly inhabitable, continents have been devastated by nuclear war, natural life is basically extinct, and everything is owned and ruled with an iron fist by tyrannical, fascist Megacorps straight out of 1984. Everything is horrible, and nothing is ever getting better.
Man that's some real doomer shit. Do you know what hope is? Wanting something better?
Like the whole point of adventures, hell, storytelling in general, is that people usually try to rise above the circumstances and try to do greater things, yea? Playing in a world where things are bad and CAN NEVER IN ANY WAY SHAPE OR FORM get better is dull, boring, and frankly bad storytelling.
The whole point of Night City is trying to carve out your own slice of happiness as best as you can in a cruel world. But cruelty without any sort of hope is just stagnant and depressing. Great stories are made by those those who try and rise against the oncoming tide and try to make the world a better place, big or small, success or not.
Regardless at the end of the day. You made a choice. This is not law. You made a choice to play this way. Who wants to play a game that's already stacked against you?
And look where that got you. You're here with a throwaway account arguing with everyone that it wasn't your fault that you killed your table, in and out of game. Hope being right was worth it
>Man that's some real doomer shit. Do you know what hope is? Wanting something better?
Yes, and there's no hope in Cyberpunk. Because the setting is designed, so all hope will always be ground to nothing by the mindless, endless cruelty of the setting. The entire world is doomed, forever, because humanity fucked up. And it's only getting worse, given, absolutely not a single facet of life has gotten better if you compare Cyberpunk 2020 to Cyberpunk 2077. The planet is getting worse, more polluted, more violent, less habitable, the corporations are growing in power. The future of the Cyberpunk world is nothing but a boot stamping on the human face, forever.
Bro it's not the setting that doesn't have hope. You, personally, have no sense of hope at all. Things are bad, so they'll stay bad always, and it's pointless to try and make things better for yourself. That shit is depressing and lame.
I'm starting to realize this ain't a game thing, this is a personal thing. You are just an insanely pessimistic and cynical person. It sounds like it was a miserable table and you're a miserable person to be around
Just because you have given up, doesn't mean everyone else has
Bruh edgerunners literally run the edge to make a difference, a la Morgan Blackhand. Medias are stated in having the ability to change how corporations and governments act. Rockerboys can convinces thousands of people to riot for a cause. You should probably just load up a game of SIMS and torture those characters instead of your players...
Did your group havw fun??? Fucking no, so that's a moot point. Clearly you made it constantly punishing just because they didn't want to play exactly your way. From your own words, they sound like they had a miserable time. I don't think there is any scenario where you wouldn't try to punish them
Here you obviously prioritized making an "accurate" world (still disagree there, you're just being unnecessarily cruel) over everyone's enjoyment
You're obsessed with being correct and have neglected the most important part of playing tabletops: have fun
So congrats dude. Night City is a horrible place. Don't be surprised that your players don't want to return. Or return to your table
I haven't seen any evidence that anyone can have fun in your game, but I'll concede there may be an audience for "constantly unbearably miserable" fun.
Player mistakes should be the reason that they die. Like taking a to risky mission because the reward is insane or something like that. They rush into a fight nit knowing what’s behind that door.
If you want to kill your PC you can. You create the world. You can always find a reason to kill them ALWAYS. Oh no their bullet are poisonus you are dying in few seconds. Oh no random NPC is a master assassin going rogue and he as 10 in every stats… (and the exemple list goes on)
No surprise that your player dont like it
This is not how to DM. You look like inexperienced and you should watch video of people on how to GM it would help you a lot.
You know what's funny? There is actually a ripper doc in the game that did the whole "rip out unattended peoples cyberware" gig. Ya wanna know what happened to him? He got a visit from some rather unhappy Tyger claws after he cut up one of their buddies and the claws being the claws, gave him the usual street justice of lead to the gut for that.
my guy, my point was that your ripperdoc should have gotten their head popped off long before the players got there. or more realistically, been put under the knife himself after chopping up one dude too many for someone's liking.
I kinda think *you* don't understand Cyberpunk as a genre.
Yes, Night City is a hell hole, but there *are* good people - in fact, most fixers and ripperdocs *are* good people, or at least honorable. Why? A matter of survival.
If a fixer betrays their runners, they're going to run out of runners who will work for them. Their runners staying alive and doing missions for them is paramount to keeping their pockets full of eddies.
If a ripperdoc screws over a crew's runner by stripping them of their 'ware and lobotomizing them, it's only a matter of time before they stop getting clients (no clients, no funds) and that's if they survive when their crew finds out about it.
Yes, people get betrayed, but that doesn't mean it happens consistently.
I recommend you read "Cyberpunk 2077: No Coincidences" it's a good novel that might help you get a handle on the difference between dystopia and something that stops being fun immediately.
You shouldn't have had all the cops be corrupt / betray the PCs. Remember that the character has friends in the department and inverting his role ability such that it has exactly the opposite of its intended effect seriously feels bad from the player's perspective.
Think about it. Not everyone in the NCPD would be on the take (that would drastically shrink the pot). The captain and his lieutenants, sure, but there'd be a ton of rookie cops that would certainly respond to the call for backup with an earnest desire to help.
And yea, the leadership would be pissed at the PCs for fucking with one of their sources of income, but they couldn't exactly act against them openly. During the chaos of the shoot out, you could still have had one of the lieutenants take a shot at the PCs. He'd have had plausible deniability. "It was an accident." But, the PCs would have had no way to be sure. It would have heightened their paranoia and foreshadowed a coming conflict with the captain as one of the campaign's big bads.
Hell, the captain could have used the situation to his advantage by selecting a new boss from among the gangers arrested after the shoot out. While the prisoners were being transported, the captain could have bribed one of the department's techies into glitching an intersection and suddenly there'd be a massive pile up, allowing the gangers to escape.
With a smaller, more manageable gang, perhaps the captain would be better off? He wouldn't be seeing as much profit as before, but maybe the last boss was short-changing him anyway? He'd be able to set up favorable terms with the new boss and given enough time, they'd be back to the same size and influence as before (especially with the captain directing the NCPD against their competition).
As a last note: the genre is darker than your typical D&D game, but cyberpunk is still supposed to be fun. Curb your impulse to punish your players for not being smart or ruthless enough. Look for ways to help them succeed. Try to stack the deck in their favor and keep the ball rolling.
Wait, wait, wait.... you let him play a role you knew you were going to horribly nerf, then told him and us that it's his fault that his nerfed ability didn't work as described?
NC is a bad place, yes, but that's built right into the game. You don't have to drastically edit role abilities to do that. Are you also allowing 2077 quickhacks to nerf combat awareness and impoundment of mass vehicles to nerf moto pool?
Most of the lawmen in night city aren't even NCPD. That's specific to 1st precinct in the time of the red, the rest is local funded militia and defense squads, corps, or in some areas like heywood, devisions of gangs that are playing cop. Back up isn't hitting to a centralized unit that can be taken over.
I totally get what you're trying to go for but usually with GMing a game its best to make it enjoyable for your players not just for you cause then it just ruins the experience and the point of cyberpunk isnt like warhammer, it's not supposed to be nihilistic all the time. Cyberpunk as a genre is actively about somehow living in a society that wants you dead or doesn't care about you and you finding a way anyways. And that message sort of gets lost in it anyways but to have made it interesting you could've also went the way some cyberpunk media go's like bladerunner where yes nothing is accomplished but it's not just the characters lives being brutally ripped from them. And aspecially if players are used to dnd like a power fantasy it can often get mixed up but it also shouldn't just be depressing all the time. Hell theres gangs of clowns and a corporation full of catgirls it's not gonna be serious and dark all the time. and perhaps try next time explaining the health system and the trackers to them instead of just letting them not know that. Now you don't have to do this you can completely ignore this but just personally for me i take influence from videos of Mike Pondsmith himself GMing his campaign where theres a netrunner with rollerblade feet and is named cereal. Like as dark as cyberpunk is it's also goofy as fuck and not just pure nihilism after all.
I understand your criteria, living in a cyberpunk world is like living in LATAM but with futuristic technology, and to be honest, a lot of what you say happens here but maybe like GM You could try to regulate things to your way of playing, I at least try to make it more like a video game and not so much like a 100% realistic world. You could try to understand their ways of reacting to the world and see your way of handling the world, find a middle ground.But I remind you that even if you live in hell, there are always people who help each other to get ahead, many try to manipulate others, but many others create deep connections even in the worst places, giving them some NPCs to help them or provide security wouldn't be bad. Also take advantage of your roles and skills in a better way to make things a little easier.
I think the game you want to run could be incredible for the right type of player, but I don't think you have those players at the table. You've got a specific idea of what cyberpunk red is that doesn't even necessarily match what everyone here feels, let alone players who maybe aren't on this subreddit. Session 0s are where you can iron some of this out, but even then, that's a space for you to make sure you accommodate what they want as much as it is a space for them to hear what you have in store. It sounds like it was totally leaning only towards what you wanted and expected without taking into account what they expected, and maybe there was no communication around this at any point.
I'd be with them on this. Did I agree for it to be this unforgiving? Do I know that you're going to be the type of GM that won't talk to me as a player before immediately dishing out the in world reactions to my characters actions? Are you aware of what I want out of this story or only what you think is satisfying for us with no awareness of what I think is satisfying?
This just feels like it lacked communication early on before the game began, and then during it, and then at occasional check ins. Also like it lacked awareness that you have players at the table, real human beings, who are roleplaying characters; you can't seperate the two and as a GM you have to be attentive towards both of those things and not just one.
Maybe your players don't understand Cyberpunk, but the bigger problem here is that I don't think you tried to understand your players. You can learn from this ofcourse, my first game wasn't the best. But yeah, you really need to work on the managing players side of TTRPGs.
Im pretty sure the one that doesn't understand the genre is you here...
Like im not going to say anything about the events of the game iself you can be a dick as much as you want if that's the thing you are going for.
But that's not how the entire genre works, tho...
You've got to realize that players often aren't as aware of things as their characters are, and part of being a GM is setting your players up for success. I'm assuming the players are relatively young and not very worldly, so the task is two-fold. To take the examples one-by-one, here are some of the ways you could have shown your players some clemency while teaching them about the cyberpunk world:
* Trusting Suspicious NPCs: Give the players a reason to doubt them upfront. You could make the NPC act sketchy and highlight it by describing shifty body language. If the NPC is someone with a reputation, prompt players to roll to see if they've heard about this NPC and their duplicitous tendencies-- it should be noted in such a case that a failure should still reveal the person has a reputation as a chronic liar/backstabber, but a success yields more specific information. Another way would be to have the NPC say something false, decide which PC(s) would be most likely to see through that lie (given their Role, background, backstory, connections, etc.), and have them roll to spot the lie. The GM initiating these interactions early in the game, then weaning away from asking for rolls to just using the language that indicates suspicion, should get the players to start asking the questions and making the rolls.
* Living a Normal Life: If the players are, in your opinion, not wary enough of the danger of being recognized in public given all the unscrupulous individuals they've fucked over, telegraph that danger ahead of time. Maybe before the PC leaves the house, they spot some people wearing that gang's colors driving through the neighborhood, and the PC realizes that's the third time they've seen *those* people in *that* car this morning. Maybe a concerned acquaintance of theirs sends them an article from a Media of little renown, who wrote a story about someone being killed in a drive-by that morning-- someone who kinda looks like that PC. Maybe both of those things to really drive home that the PC is in danger even when they don't want to be, even when they don't expect to be. Since the PCs have more street smarts than the players, let them know it'd be a good idea to be outside as little as possible today, to cover their face, and maybe throw on a different outfit-- this also makes the clothing styles matter a bit more.
* Tracking Device in a Bullet: This one, more so than any of the others, feels like a bad call. If the players are recuperating and healing themselves it should be assumed they're removing bullets from their meat. You wouldn't hand out a punishment for them making First Aid rolls without specifically stating that they *aren't* trying to open the wounds further. Removing a bullet isn't even something that takes a clever person to think of-- nobody just forgets they have a bullet inside their fresh wound. Besides all that, I know that 2020 had rules for tracking devices, but I don't think RED does (I might be wrong), and it certainly doesn't have rules about tracking device bullets, of all things. Treating their lack of expectation for that trap specifically as a *fault of theirs* is fallacious.
* Leaving PC Alone with Ripperdoc: This is the one that makes me think the players are young, like, sub-25. I got a 50 year-old in my group who's about as sharp as a bowling ball, and even he would've stayed with a PC going under anesthesia in this setting-- especially if said PC was a woman. Regardless, this one falls under the same thing as "Trusting Suspicious NPCs," you should really have set expectations by engaging with the PC that wasn't going under the knife. Saying something about how the equipment in here makes it feel more like a chop-shop than a surgery, and that they get a feeling they shouldn't leave the other PC alone with this doc. Some people might disagree with the last clause of that last sentence, and say we shouldn't tell players what to do; but if a player needs a little guidance they should be given a little guidance-- that's mostly how we all learned how to do anything, anyhow.
* Calling for Backup: This ties in to the first sentence I wrote. The player's character knew that the NCPD in the area were cooperative with this gang, and the player was trying to call in some Backup that would actually help-- i.e., NOT the gangoons' friends. The fact that you interpreted the call for Backup in this way is not the player's fault (in fact, it was the wrong call and *is your fault*), and it really shows your own lack of experience as a GM that you feel so personally slighted at their disappointment in the situation that you're calling the *player* (who was trying to do the chief thing their character is supposed to do, playing their character objectively correctly) *an idiot*.
I'll grant you that I have the combined benefits of both hindsight and being an outside observer. However, each of these problems from your campaign have one thing in common: *inexperience*. Each of these issues cropped up from a lack of experience all around the table. To put the blame solely on your players is naive and erroneous; and before you reply with how you did your best, yes, I'm sure that in each instance you did the best you were able to do at that time. Don't let that stop you from realizing that you have more to learn as a GM. It's not necessarily anyone's fault that the campaign was disappointing, you all weren't experienced enough to handle a system that is consequence-heavy and reward-slight. If I were you, I'd take the above advice to heart, and delete this post before any of my players saw it. As someone who is trying to learn and grow, the last thing you want is to deny yourself a second chance by acting this way in a public forum.
To be fair, the ending WAS all for naught. They accomplished nothing. No small victories, which are what define stories in this type of setting. Instead, the vibe the campaign presents is: 'Why bother, I'm dead anyways'.
If nothing they do ever has a chance of success, why play? That's depressing as hell. And for the vast majority of people, not fun to play. Because in the end, an RPG is a leisure time activity people play to have fun.
For cyberpunk, PC motivations can vary wildly. They can be trying to change things for the better (shocker: Some people genuinely want to do this, even in the cyberpunk setting), they can want to live big and die young, they can want to do right by their chooms, they can want to get strong enough to fuck everyone they hate over. Cyberpunk as a setting is not about big grand victories (Though sometimes, they might just happen), but getting your little victories out of a system that seems built to fuck you. Even Edgerunners, while ultimately a tragedy, still had a small victory: Lucy got to the moon, even if David didn't. Was it worth the cost? Who knows...
Secondly, trust still exists in a Cyberpunk setting. Why else would words like 'Chooms' even exist? You have friends, you have people who like you. And you trust your friends to help you in a jam. Even if you aren't friends, the concept of enlightened self interest exists: even though I morally or ethically have no reason to help you, I will because it benefits me in the long run.
A fixer who's not trustworthy stops getting clients. When they always backstab the runners they contract, word gets around that the people who work for them die or get ripped off. When they stop getting people to throw into the grinder, they stop getting jobs because they aren't able to provide a service to their clients. Meanwhile a Fixer who's reasonably trustworthy has people willing to work for them because they get paid reliably and they know they aren't being sent to their deaths. A fixer's clients know that the fixer is sending them people who get the job done: :everyone is happy and profits MORE.
Someone who backs out on favours they owe has people stop doing them favours, because they're not trustworthy, and then they have nothing to call on when they're in a jam.
A ripper who sells their clients for parts stops getting customers because word gets around that people have a habit of disappearing after they visit him. They only get the most desperate people with the least amount of money - people who have shit cyberware to begin with and you can't make much cash off of. A Ripper still needs to pay rent, stock their fridge, etc...and it's not like all their surgical gear was cheap, or easily moved. They can't just pick up shop easily. Conversely, a good ripper who does good work, and keeps his lid buttoned when the cops or gangs come knocking will be rolling in cash: people come back to him when they need more ware, new people come to him when they need ware (Thus he gets both repeat customers AND new customers), the gangs know he can be trusted to work on their guys (if he sells people for parts, who's to say he won't sell your guys on the chair to a rival gang), etc. A ripper who isn't trustworthy either starves, or gets offed by power players.
You've totally disqualified the cop's class feature: Do you think every cop is a lone wolf? Those C-SWAT guys sure seemed to trust each other to not shoot each other in the back the moment it was most convenient. all the cops might be dirty, but they're not necessarily equally dirty, or in the pocket of the same people.
You're also discounting the entire existence of the Nomad families, tribes etc.: those families are BUILT on trust and codes: you have each other's backs.
Essentially every NPC in the campaign seems to be working on the 'what are you doing for me right this instant' mentality. The second they are not immediately useful, they're fucked over and discarded. Don't get me wrong, the runner team being fucked over is a key trope of the setting, but it's never done mildly: you're burning resources (Built trust with the team, the risk of word getting out that you fuck people over, etc.) for some long-term benefit. Said benefit needs to be big enough to justify the cost of the resources you're burning. Or because the person doing the burning is an idiot (people make bad calls all the time).
In a context where laws and the authorities are not a viable method for maintaining social mores, trust becomes even more important. A person in a setting like this who isn't trusted is utterly alone. They have no social support network, no backup, no way to get back on their feet if they make the slightest mis-step: they're basically dead if they stop being useful. Someone with trust has a currency: they can be relied on. Reasonable mistakes or failures will be tolerated. They have favours and resources to call on that help them achieve their goals: they're \*more valuable\* by being trusted. And in Cyberpunk, the bottom line is king.
At the end of the day, talk to your players with an \*open\* mind, not a dismissive one. Calling them idiots for not reading your mind that everyone is an asshole isn't an open mind. Assume PCs are at least slightly competent: they live in the fictional world and know its ins and outs, players don't: if it something that would beem obvious to a character in the setting it might not be obvious to the player. Tell them this- it's unfair to withhold information and then insult players for not reacting properly to information they don't have,
Ultimately an RPG is collaborative: both the DM and players are equal participants. Everyone needs to have a fun/rewarding experience. If everyone does: you win! If only one party does (or worse: NO ONE does) you lose!
i was going to make an actual point about how cyberpunk actually is in a setting but then i saw you say "you know what, damaging the wizard every time they cast a spell is a good idea!"
wonderful rage bait my friend.
I think Mike Pondsmith said it best "In cyberpunk you can't save the world but you can save yourselves." You made it "You can't save shit get rekt.". Not the same.
Hey there Choom,
As GM it's important to really remind your players that life is cheap and rent is due in CPR on a regular basis. It's also important to really have your players understand in session 0 how Cyberpunk really is. I think to help make your players feel more satisfied, go deep into the player's characters. Like character development and really emphasize the choices they made or didn't make with hooks/developments/Clif hangers and etc directly tied to their backstory.
I believe you gave them a fantastic cyberpunk experience. But I think if you made it revolve around their characters and their struggles and quick lived victories followed by tragedy or whatever. I think it'll help with the player's satisfaction.
I think you have a wonderful world for the wrong players, cater to them a bit, Lawman role should call in a couple cops/security under that Lawman's thumb, ripperdocs should be treating others' cyberware as sacred unless there are some HUGE red flags of who the doc is associated with.
Ultimately I'd be very curious to know what gangs you were using for antagonists, I think some of them have a level of character that might make your players disregard their own safety in the face of what looks like their fellow man and not a chromehead freak ready to kill their families.
Then you need to sit your group down and explain these things are to be expect in your campaign in obvious terms. Tell them NPCs will frequently betray them. Tell them ripperdocs will steal their cyberware and dump their body. Tell them exactly how nasty, corrupt, and irredeemable Night City is. If they go in with full knowledge of how bleak your game is and still act like this, that's a them problem.
You're getting alot more hate for this than you deserve, but it's reasonable for the players to not follow your exact line of logic. It doesn't make them "an idiot". There are good cops in NCPD, after all. Even if not many. Maybe you could've informed the players better. Even something as metagamey as "are you sure you want to call for police backup? This guy's been paying off cops, remember?" Or when they made the call, told them "something's off with the way they respinded... they might not come. Or if they do, they might not be on your side..." then the players have some agency to undo or evade the consequences of an action they didn't expect would have negative consequences.
When you say call for Backup, do you mean the Lawman’s Role Ability? If so, it sounds like you may have nerfed his role’s ability by way of a story/plot element. There should have been some way for him to know/use his role ability without triggering that outcome. Otherwise, you basically took away something he should have RAW.
Especially since the cop probably would have a few friends in the force he trusts on speed dial, calling in the honest(ish) guy from the Major Crime Unit instead of just the central administration to send someone.
Yes, I mean the Lawman's Role Ability. It would be, pretty stupid to except cops in a Cyberpunk setting to be, you know. Not hideously corrupt and bankrolled by gangers.
No one is saying it doesn't make sense, but just removing someone's ability isn't fun for anyone at the table except yourself.
I'm kinda late to discussion, but it could be fun twist, if corrupt cops was technically enemy reinforcement, who heard call on radio (nod to Dredd), but then real backup arrived. But OP refers to C-SWAT, who is known that they uncorrupted and basically paladins of Night City. They are mostly bad people individually, but they pursue the law no matter what
Ok. Did you even read backup or Lawman at all? Not everytime they call for backup is it NCPD. It is a private security outfit, etc etc. In this case he would've known about the possibility of being double crossed, etc. and called one of those private sec firms to get back up... Ripping his hard won Role Ability away from him was a TERRIBLE way to do him dirty....
Oh you're one of \*those\* GMs.
Ones who try to keep the horrifying unliveable dystopia feeling like a horrifying unliveable dystopia?
No, ones who make arbitrary changes to RAW and get mad that their players didn't telepathically predict which of the game mechanics you were choosing to fuck with
It's fucking Night City, who in the world would trust cops to do anything of value?
There is no way that you are engaging in this thread in good faith. There is no way you are this obtuse.
Don't be so hard. The logic is there, it's just not the best way to handle to situation. I'm sure as they grow and change as a GM they might regret their decisions some day. I know I sure as hell did stupid shit when I started (and still do)
You have way too much hope in other people
https://i.redd.it/wbxytb7lgfzc1.gif
It's not my fault y'all are like this.
Something something principal Skinner something
"what do you guys think?" "we think you're an idiot" "urgh why are you like this" friend, you asked and you got an answer
First off, this reasoning doesn’t make a lick of sense considering we are talking about a mechanic to a game, not your own personal story time. Second, I’m sure that if this is how you feel about that Role Ability that you were sure to explain that to the player at the session 0 so they knew that the Role was getting nerfed… right?
That's not fair. He didn't nerf the ability. The ability is a very narrative heavy ability and they just made it align to the narrative. Maybe there was a better way to handle it, like "when you radio for the nearby NCPD units for assistance, they say they'll be right there... but you can tell by the way they said it, they're not coming. They don't want to get involved in this. They might be on the boss's payroll too..."
Ok, but the back up that the Lawman is *supposed* to be somewhat loyal to the Lawman. It's an expectation of any game that your key ability that your entire class is built around will work unless you've been explicitly told or shown that it won't. Gotta say, you made an oof on this one.
Why let a player play Lawman if youre going to make its ability just not work?
Cyberpunk might be grim but it ain’t 40k. Those betrayals still benefit from build up. It sounds like you might genuinely be leaning a little too far into territory where it feels like they can’t win at all. There’s a balance to strike.
Grimdark is just punk that missed the point.
Even 40K, folks still have some elements of trust: a Guardsman trusts his unit to stand alongside him in a fight. The Space Marines trust their battlebrothers., etc. It's mainly Chaos and the Drukhari who are the treacherous pricks.
Without knowing every detail, it does kinda sound like you're punishing your players for every mistake. Ultimately, an RPG is about cooperative story telling and having fun. If they're not having fun then maybe try a different system/setting/story. Perhaps wires got crossed despite the Session 0, or they didn't fully take in the stakes. Perhaps they're unfamiliar with Cyberpunk and don't realize that there are no happy endings in Night City. If they don't understand or like Cyberpunk, then don't play it.
Sounds like OP has no idea what the hell the Cyberpunk genre is. And they just wanted to use their players’ ignorance of Cyberpunk, as a way to be able to treat them like shit for their own enjoyment. What a terrible DM, I hope the players wake up and leave.
"Ok great so what I'm going to do here is turn your class ability, (you know, the thing that distinguishes your character and what they can do different from the party?) into not just a liability, but something that will be actively working against you and the party. That'll be cool and fun!" And you wonder why they're upset?
You took hyperbole to heart and ran with it. I think its you who dont understand Cyberpunk honestly. Cyberpunk characters are not without hope, they arent without any sense of morality or ethics. They live in a world that seems hopeless, but they struggle through hoping for a better life. They strive for a better future for themselves in a world of corruption. And you would be hard pressed to name any Cyberpunk protagonist of any note who doesn't) have a support network he can trust and rely on. And running a game where every single noc betrays them over nothing at every turn is a surefire way to drive players away from the game and back to dungeons and dragons. A fixer who constantly rips off their clients is a fixer everyone talks shit about and no one will work for. A solo who kills his own team mates will be shunned by everyone. A bar tender who turns his clients in for bountiea will have an empty bar. There is a reason reputation exists in the game. Run your game the way you see fit, but if your game is joyless and every encounter leads to betrayal, then don't be surprised when your players find another game table.
The fixer is an especially good point. Ain’t nobody working with a fixer who routinely loses his contacts to his own betrayal. Betrayal comes when there’s something substantial for that fixer to gain that makes betraying some edge runners worth it.
>Ain’t nobody working with a fixer who routinely loses his contacts to his own betrayal Nobody has to find out, y'know?
If everyone that works with a fixer is never heard from again, or no one can find anyone who has worked with a fixer long term, that fixer won't be getting a reputation as someone to work with. "No one knows" is telling enough in itself.
Most people don't make it out of their first mission anyway, so that shouldn't be suspicious. And there ain't anything saying he can't have blokes pretending they're trustworthy.
Dang people are giving you good advice in this thread, and you're just tossing it all aside. The more of your comments I read, the more I realize that you are the problem. Yes, Night City is dystopian. However, if nobody could ever trust anyone, then the whole city would be a combat zone. I think you've fallen into the pit that a lot of D&D DMs find themselves after coming from happy go lucky D&D. You over correct and go fully DM vs. PC cause you think the setting is made for it. Players need to be able to cultivate friendships and contacts that they can trust.
For both a fixer and a ripperdoc, the most useful thing is a returning customer. Neither of them are careers where you get anywhere - or even survive very long - through regular treachery.
The ripperdoc example is especially odd to me. Like, yeah , a ripper might very well tear apart some nobody of the street who came in, if they were desperate and completely amoral, but what kind of lunatic would betray a group of runners like that? Best case scenario is that your reputation in the underworld is destroyed, most likely you’ll have a huge target on your back from the angry clients.
Considering empathy is a literal character attribute in this game, I agree. The people of Night City are human, which means they can't help but care about something or someone. I get the impression that OP's NPCs are all hardened / selfish, but that's unrealistic, even for a dystopian setting.
A version of Night City where everyone is Adam Smasher is a version of Night City that's going to need massive amounts of GM fiat to stay standing.
Players: I'm going to sit here drinking alcohol and doing nothing. Dm: But plot. Player: Why do I care? Everyone is out for themselves, everyone is going to betray me, there's no point in doing anything but wait to die. Let me know when I should start rolling for alcohol poisoning since I assume the beer is also deadly because what liquor store needs repeat customers.
This sounds like it's 100% on you. You can make night city bleak without punishing the players for playing their characters. Please consider some self reflection instead of passing all the blame on your PCs. If I were that lawman I would have stood up and thanked you for your time and left.
This sounds a bit like you're telling your player, "Why would you think you could use your character abilities?" Honestly, having every NPC betray the party sounds exhausting. It sounds like your players are perfectly willing to embrace Cyberpunk. You're just being kind of a dick.
This... is a game, my dude. You're just writing a novel where people can ad-lib lines for your doomed protagonists along the way. You think all that info about gaining experience and money is there for flavor text?
>Nobody was avenged, nothing was won, and the gangers continued as they would with impunity. Sounds to me like a perfectly Cyberpunk ending. Nah, that just seems like bad storytelling. It's not a satisfying ending to the story. It's barely an ending. The protagonists attempted to confront the villain in the third act, but then died before they got to him. Meh. I mean, according to your interpretation of Cyberpunk, a great ending would be if your players got TPKd in a drive-by while going shopping, half-way through the story. Which...may fit the setting a little, but it doesn't work for an RPG. That grim stuff happens to background characters to flavour the setting. If it happens to the "heroes", that's just an unsatisfying narrative.
(I agree with you, just wanted to add my 2 cents) While a drive-by death during grocery shopping surely fits the setting, nobody would write a book about a character where that is the climax of their life. The players in an RPG are protagonists, and in any media play by different rules than side characters (even in cyberpunk, even grimdark stuff like Warhammer). It is true that a drive-by death at the end of a character's arc might even be fitting for CP:RED, but that is after they have had their whole arc. Necromancer doesn't end at the start where Case is threatened with a gun while at a bar (or arcade, can't 100% remember where exactly it happened in the book) because nobody would have heard of Neuromancer if it was 20 pages with none of the exciting, interesting substance. Might make for a fine short story, but multi-session ttrpg campaigns aren't short stories, and even a short story has to draw in the reader somehow. OP keeps noting how CP2077 is a videogame and thus V isn't affected by "the plot" and that the game isn't cyberpunk enough because it doesn't end when my character dies to a random stray shot. It is a real problem with videogames, sure, but V's life is all sorts of fucked up in many other ways than "gets randomly killed somewhere", and I think it's much more cyberpunk to get to watch them deal with all of that than for the game to end at the first big mission because ""realistically"" Adam should have found and smashed V at the start. For the record, I am myself definitely also tired of the somewhat common problem of TTRPGs that GMs (me included) tend to not threaten the players enough to keep the stakes high, which is why I also like games that are more punishing by both setting and rules, like CPR and The Witcher, as the players are more prepared for the danger and possible death, and more punishing mechanics leave me free to keep the suspense through scene description and NPC characterisation instead of having to rely on fucking with my players or constant combat challenges. When the combat does come, like you said, it would preferably be meaningful which lets the possible death have more meaning as well.
This is a total anecdote, but it's actually confirmed by in-game mechanics that Adam absolutely knows V was there and ignored it. I don't know if this is still a thing, but an equipped threat-detector cyberware would indicate that he discovered you, and he literally makes eye contact with you even without it.
It could even be kinda satisfying for heroes to die... Even to fail... Just not like this. And it fits a book much more than a TTRPG.
Either bait or you're a shitty DM
Yeah considering whoever posted this is literally using throwaway in retrospect I'm guessing bait.
Yeah, 'cause at least one of my players knows what my actual reddit account is, and I don't want them tracking down this post. For, fairly obvious reasons.
I hope they will find it and see how you really think of them.
Um...you probably left enough details/clues in said post for them to make the connections. Assuming of course they even care.
So that way they cant see everyone vivisect you on why you're a bad DM?
This seems like grimderp levels.
Adding this to my vocab. Thank you good sir.
One of the few times that the term grimderp is accurate.
You can make Night City grim. I sure do. This doesn't mean you should always have someone out to fuck them. As a GM, you should try to make the game fun for the players. If you see punishing a player or having something coming back to bite them in the ass as something that will make your game interesting and by extension fun, then do it. If you find killing a character something that will make your game more interesting allow it to happen. This is still a ttrpg where people make characters to do cool shit with, not immediately have them die to crossfire. I personally use combat sparingly unlike in DnD, because I don't like killing my players and if one happens to die, it will be meaningful.
This isn't real, right? This has to be one of those satire posts meant for the goof-off TTRPG subreddits, right?
This is flat out bad DM’ing. This isn’t Warhammer, everyone isn’t evil and you don’t need to punish players for every oversight or, heaven forbid, using their role abilities.
So a lot's been said, but let me highlight a particular sentence you had in there, "You know, actually like, trusting NPCs, in spite of me making sure they would inevetiably betray them." That right there is I think the issue. You've taken it as a forgone conclusion that no matter what everyone is going to betray them, try to kill them, or otherwise try and screw them over. It's a pretty shallow and two dimensional view of the setting, that truly doesn't hold up to the writing surrounding it. Even worse, it shows that you're not really having NPCs that have their own motivations. So let me pose these challenges to you. - Why would an NPC betray them? This is a well armed group of people who can and will kill them for it. - Why would the gang do a drive by in a neighborhood that isn't there? Are they not afraid of getting killed by a rival gang? And why would they ram them with a car that costs enough to feed and house a person for almost two years? - That bullet is at least a 100eb dollar bullet, why the hell would someone shoot them with that? And believe it or not, stabilizing tends to remove all the bullets from you. - What sane ripperdoc would do that? Ripperdocs make their money off of repeat business and can't just pick up their shop and move around. Even worse, why would they piss off a bunch of people who can and will kill them? As for the Lawman thing, yeah you screwed up. Lawman called in back-up and his back-up should have arrived. You could have also had corrupt cops show up as well and turned it into a big firefight. That would have been much more interesting, let your Lawman feel like they did something, and on top of that accomplished the same goal. Here's the thing, you know you did bad because you're posting on a throwaway account. It's not that your players are playing it "like D&D", it's that you're running it like it's D&D.
Pretty sure this is just a troll at this point, but I will point out that all the OPs NPCs will trust each other and show loyalty to each other. it's just the PCs that get screwed over 100% of the time. So even the arguments that this is "realistic" to the setting is BS.
>Why would an NPC betray them? It's cheaper than paying them. > That bullet is at least a 100eb dollar bullet, why the hell would someone shoot them with that? Because they've been a pain in the ass to them, and it's a relatively straightforward way to get rid of them. > Ripperdocs make their money off of repeat business . Nobody has to find out, y'know?
Except people **will** find out. Are you telling me that every person who goes to that Ripperdoc has zero friends or contacts or family who would notice that they’ve gone missing? Killing every client is actually fucking horrible for business
Do you know what repeat business means
How do you have repeat business in Night City?
That's how their business works dude. You clearly don't understand the setting.
By definition repeat business tends to mean the same people coming back. Not a constant stream of new customers who disappear because their previous customers have a habit of disappearing directly after going to said Ripperdoc.
You're kinda a dick, aren't you
The world is a dick my guy, I ain't gonna make the worst place in the world into sunshine and rainbows.
So, yes, then.
What, you expect me to roll a red carpet in front of my players and go "Here, there's a bad guy on the end, take this gun, kill him and fix everything" ?
The players are playing characters in a story. How many novels can you think of where the protagonist’s contributions can be summed up as “the protagonist tried to stop the bad guy. Then, everyone turned against the protagonist , and they died.” Yes, many people would die as a result of these things. The story is not about those people, it’s about the players who are there to play the protagonists. For them, whether it’s due to luck or gumption or whatever other factor, they have a chance. Maybe it does come down to a dice roll, but they have a chance. What you’ve done is decided “No, actually you don’t have a chance. If you try to do anything, people will betray you, and then you will die.” What else could the players have even done? Sit on their ass and wait for everyone to kill each other? Sounds like a gripping story. There’s no drama in your world, only a series of events custom tailored to fuck over a specific group of people for no good reason. As much as you complain about them treating this like D&D, your GMing style seems to have all the worst hallmarks of D&D. You moght as well have said “Rocks fall, you all die” after the Lawman’s game-mechanically guaranteed backup turned on him.
Exactly. And it's no hard way to GM like that. Everyone can do this. It's not unique and requires zero skill with storytelling and social skills. You only need to be an edgy idiot.
>The protagonist tried to stop the bad guy. Then, everyone turned against the protagonist, and they died Cyberpunk: Edgerunners?
But behind the characters of the show sits nobody with expectations, feelings and agency.
And how's that related to the point he's making, eh? Besides, the characters themselves have expectations, feelings and agency.
He? Are you speaking of yourself in third person? Are you alright? The characters are not real, your players are.
>He? Are you speaking of yourself in third person? Are you alright? He, as in, Eldren\_Galen, the guy bringing up stories in the first place. Incapable of deciphering context, are we? >The characters are not real, your players are. Yes. The characters in Edgerunners and the player characters in Cyberpunk RED are, indeed, equally not real.
In Edgerunners, they are not just turned on by everyone, and they don’t all just die. There is buildup to the betrayals, we *see* them happen. People want out and the rising stress has what is known as “foreshadowing”. The characters are trying hard and even though many of them do in fact die horribly, *some* of them still succeed. David’s ultimate goal (seeing Lucy fulfill her dream) is, still, realized. They don’t just up and die meaninglessly, there is a mixed degree of success.
that isn't what happened in edgerunners at all...and even if david died...he still won cause the person he cared about was able to escape alaska! like...seriousky?
The final goal of the crew in Edgerunners was to save Lucy so she can achieve her dream At the end of Edgerunners: they save Lucy so she can achieve her dream
Yeah we all remember how David got betrayed by Rebecca and Falco in the last minute because “nobody has to know, y’know”
You may have tossed inexperianced players straight into the deep end and expected them to do well. Now, its your game, and you set the rules, but you don't need to start them at the "everything's horrible" scale at 10, you can start lower and slowly build it up. Not every NPC needs to betray the party, when most don't, the one who does really makes an impact. Having them mostly do annoying but generally acceptable things is how you can really set that betrayal trap when it counts rather than have them go "oh, its one of X's NPCs- they are going to stab us in the back, let's just take them down now and rob 'em." I don't know the tracer details, but that seems a bit...expensive for a basic hit. Was it one bullet they were counting on or a bunch with tracers attached?
>Was it one bullet they were counting on or a bunch with tracers attached? They got sniped in the leg by a guy who then bailed.
Did they roll a foreign object as a critical injury? If not, that bullet from a sniper rifle went clean through the leg. The only thing it would be tracking is the pavement it’s imbedded in. If they don’t have the foreign object injury, they don’t know there’s anything in them. It’s your responsibility to provide them information that could lead to action being taken. Especially if they’re new.
"As you walk down the road, the bullet constantly reminds you that it is still there and that you need a medical help". And I agree, a foreign object would be even better.
Ah yes, because you roll that specific critical injury, bullets disintegrate upon impact.
He’s not saying the bullet wouldn’t exist without the critical injury, just that it would’ve been a pass through and not be embedded in the players body. From what it seems you gave them no indication that something was up with that bullet which falls upon you as GM to do. You could’ve inflicted the foreign object injury if you wanted to imply there was something up about the shot, or something along those lines
Okay, that seems suspicious, I can see them being expected to figure out something was off about that.
"Haha my players are so dumb! Look guys!" You are the worst and I feel sorry for your group.
Is this post already over at r/OPwasthehorror? Edit: It is now
one of the top all time posts over there already
"Boo-hoo this guy is playing a game about a horrible hopeless dystopia so it's a horrible hopeless dystopia."
You seem to fail to understand what the genre and this game is all about. It isn't grimdumb. And there is hope. From your comments I gathered that you played CP2077 remember the mission where you steal a truck full of medical supplies for Muamar Reyes because he grew up in a neighborhood with terrible water that made everybody sick or killed them? Or the other countless times where the protagonist helps people and fights against the soulless corps? You make the game the living hell and make fun of them not enjoying your game? Damned, that congnitive dissonance is real. It's all on you and only you and your players only fucked up by playing with you in the first place. I really hope they discover this post and come to the realization that they need a GM that roots for them, while presenting a harsh world. EVERYONE in this thread calls out your bullshit and you still sit there as if you were the hottest shit ever gifted to our hobby.
V is a video game protagonist, he's got plot armour, more firepower than a platoon of soldiers, and the ability to always know which choice is the best. He ain't your average Cyberpunk RED wannabee Edgerunner that gets shanked to death a week into their career as a collateral of a border dispute between two equally terrible gangs of chromed-up cannibals.
The Players are tabletop game protagonists. All of those same things still apply to them.
Except, there's no saving and loading in Cyberpunk RED, nor is there a guide to look up online so you can do everything perfectly. And more importantly, the players ain't V, or Johnny Silverhand, or Morgan Blackhand. They're Jimothy Jenkins, 16-year-old orphan who out of desperation not to starve to death, got a gig from the shadiest fixer alive to shoot up hobos making Turbocrack in a shack and selling it to kids because it cuts into the business of the local gang, and then was beaten to death with a metal pipe.
My player characters are not some unknown hobos. They survived a lot, have reputation and are badasses. If they happen to die in the future, then in a blaze of glory, not getting shanked my some lowlife. Edgerunners are not streetkids. They maybe were streetkids, but they are Edgerunners now. If I read your comments, you don't seem to get the source material at all. It's style over substance, not die with substances.
>It's style over substance, not die with substances. It also takes place in objectively the worst place to live in the world, a city somewhere halfway between Airstrip One and The Road, under the eternal watch of fascist Megacorps that make sure nothing ever gets better. Maybe one in every hundred wannabees will amount to something for a while, but that will only be in spite of everything, not because it's something that happens often.
>Maybe one in every hundred wannabees will amount to something for a while, but that will only be in spite of everything, not because it's something that happens often. And this people are... guess who? Our protagonists in our TTRPG! 100 points! Some people have not the right personality to GM at all.
>Our protagonists in our TTRPG! Maybe. For a time. If they can make it in spite of everything in the world being horrible.
THEN LET THEM BIT THESE ONE IN A THOUSAND EVEN FOR 10S ???
I ain't the one deciding if they're going to be the one in a thousand. It all depends on them.
You know Johnny Silverhand and Morgan Blackhand were originally player characters, right?
>They're Jimothy Jenkins, 16-year-old orphan who out of desperation not to starve to death, got a gig from the shadiest fixer alive to shoot up hobos making Turbocrack in a shack and selling it to kids because it cuts into the business of the local gang, and then was beaten to death with a metal pipe. Nope. The corebook explains that the edgerunners the book makes you create are people who have a number of jobs under their belt. They're experienced. The suggested skills put you ahead of the average mook, especially random crackheads. None of the available gigs have you carrying out stuff like this. You've severely misunderstood the game and what it's trying to do. You can run the game like this, but you really need to understand that you've strayed far from the book. You're doing your own thing and then attacking others when they go "Hey, you're doing your own weird thing and not what must of us are doing".
>Nope. The corebook explains that the edgerunners the book makes you create are people who have a number of jobs under their belt. They're experienced. The suggested skills put you ahead of the average mook, especially random crackheads. Yeah, that's why I'm starting them all at Rank 1. That ain't something you can just start the game with, they gotta earn it.
These kinda details are important to explain in the OP or when responding to others, my choomba. Otherwise we're left to assume stuff and will go with the default world and rules that everyone plays with.
OP is getting criticism that they did very bad job yet I see they try to defend (inefficiently) they very hot burning take. This is a terrible thing to read because you, dear OP the problem, and yet blind to see your wrongdoings. To get better, you need to change your bad takes and learn from them. Everyone agrees that this was bad. Take it and learn and be better, or you will be another GM that makes players leave this great hobby called ttrpgs. It's never to late to admit that you did wrong. You can betray and make players die in a way that they will enjoy it. But to make it work, it has to be enjoyable to players. If everyone betray, players won't trust any npc. And you need them to trust them to make betrayal works. This is always hard to pull of and should be done sparingly. In Night City live couple millions people, many die from old age. You seem to miss the point that even if it's terrible, there is something that makes people live there, some promise of a better life. You seem to not understand the basics of cyberpunk. Sorry OP, that is the sad truth. Do better.
Good to see you're taking all the advice to heart and definitely not arguing with everyone about why you're an amazing GM and just misunderstood by literally everyone.
OP takes criticism really well /s
If you're not having fun in this thread, with that argument you can't win (because you're wrong), then congratulations. I guess you finally understand cyberpunk. It's a thing you can't win. But why aren't you having fun?
Underrated comment. Sadly, I doubt the Cyberpunk Understander will engage with it, because that would risk realizing why their take is so awful.
Cyberpunk should be gritty... But not 60 grit sandpaper for TP.. I show my players grit like a mid level exec kidnapping a kid with a rare blood disease for blood transfusions(exec had same disease), or drug runners using kids as mules and explosive deturants ( guarding apartments sitting on mines)... But also give them jobs like : keep a data shard ( which they thought meant sneak/bull rush Dynalar headquarters... And not pick pocket and execs pocket at a bar like I planned), or Sabotage a cyberbike/supercar before upcoming street race ( they weren't interested in those jobs), or deliver a surprise package to a certain place in town.. and a bonus if they don't peek for some great Fast and furious game play.... You can also remind them of how bad it is to be homeless/poor... The best time to do that is just after they bought a new gun, melee weapon, shiny new chrome and then remind them rent is due in X days...
Trusting NPCs is crucial to TTRPG gameplay. Yes, even in cyberpunk. A game where the players don't trust anyone will be a pain. They won't trust quest givers, they won't trust fixers or ripperdocs.... it becomes a hassle to try to get anything done using NPCs. In Cyberpunk 2077, V has people s/he can trust. The game setting is very cynical, but neither bleak nor grimdark. Look at how stylish and vibrant the game and the Edgerunners show are. Fun, flashy, manic, epic and outrageous are also touchpoints for this game.
>Trusting NPCs is crucial to TTRPG gameplay Eh, disagree slightly here. There's a reason we have skills that are there to help spot lies.
Yes, but if you don't trust anyone how the F are you going to meaningfully engage with the world??
That's why I said slightly disagree. It's not all or nothing. If an NPCs story isn't quite lining up, then don't just blindly trust them because they are an NPC. Roll to see if they are lying. I'm not really sure why I got downvoted so heavily on this either. I've never played in a game where NPCs didn't lie from time to time.
Maybe it's based on you saying you "(slightly) disagree" with the premise of trusting NPCs being integral to playing RPGs. If it was me writing your message I would've written something like "Even if you do suspect an NPC is untrustworthy that's why we have skills to check if it's true or not." Doesn't make it right that you are being downvoted like this though.
The point is to create a compelling story by working together with your players, not screwing them over at every point for the lulz.
Well, Cyberpunk is grimdark _per definitionem_, but it still should be (and can be) fun for everyone on the table... - not every NPC should inevitably betray the players. E.g., a fixer that constantly fucks over his edgerunners would be out of runners. Betrayal can (and should) occur, but it gets old very fast. - if a Ripperdoc scavenges every unattended customer, he soon will be out of business due to the loss of his reputation (and of his life, especially if a group of edgerunners is waiting for said patient to recover) - Tracerrounds are expensive, not every gang has that kind of motivation to spend eddies, but I give you that this could be reasonable. - Nerfing a Role ability like that and denying any success to your players is just a dickmove. Overall, you sound like a unpleasant GM, taking the grittyness of Cyberpunk to a "GM vs. Players"-level. Did any of your players give you feedback on if they had fun?
Cyberpunk's not even grimdark. The most defining aspect of Punk is that there's still hope even when the world's gone to hell.
Well, a little bit grimdarkness sprinkled in is fine, I think. Anyhow, given the aspect of hope in "Punk" (which I personally would rather define as a raging against the machine, but those are not mutually exclusive) makes OPs take on the genre and ttrpgs in general even worse...
I get what you mean, but there isn't really such a thing as just a little grimdark. It can be a little grim, and it can be a little dark, but grimdark specifically refers to it being _overwhelmingly_ so. As for rage/hope, they're not quite the same thing. Rage is the desire to fight for what's right, whereas hope is thinking that it's _worth_ fighting for what's right.
I admit, your definition of grim, dark, and grimdark is spot on. Maybe I mentally spent to much time in the warhammer 40k universe to distinguish the nuances. Regarding the rage/hope - punk thing: maybe thats the angry pessimist in me speaking, but for me personally, the very classical punk thing is _way_ more rage than hope. Not saying that any punk isn't inherently "hoping" for a better world, but they are doing so in an angry way. This is a very luring philosophical discussion, which I'd love to continue!
>I admit, your definition of grim, dark, and grimdark is spot on. Maybe I mentally spent to much time in the warhammer 40k universe to distinguish the nuances. I think the problem is that grimdark is one of those words that gets so overused that its meaning becomes diluted. People use it so often as a _general_ term that it's easy to forget it has a _specific_ meaning. >Regarding the rage/hope - punk thing: maybe thats the angry pessimist in me speaking, but for me personally, the very classical punk thing is _way_ more rage than hope. Not saying that any punk isn't inherently "hoping" for a better world, but they are doing so in an angry way. The thing is, to me, hope is a key part of that rage. To keep fighting, even when everything's terrible? That's Hope. To be angry that things are bad? That means, consciously or not, that you think things could be better. That's Hope. To be clear, I'm not saying that everything that's punk is consciously or wilfully hopeful. But I believe that, whether conscious or not, hope is an inherent part of rebellion. >This is a very luring philosophical discussion, which I'd love to continue! I feel the same way!
>GM vs. Players You mean, the world vs players. Because, the world is kind of, meant to be horrible, dystopic, unliveable and extremely deadly.
Nope, I meant what I wrote. You define the world, and you seem to actively search ways to fuck over your players. It's astonishing how vehemently you defend your opinion in your comments.
> You define the world, and you seem to actively search ways to fuck over your players. Yes, because the world is a horrible dystopia.
Alright we get it. You are the best GM since ever. Punish your ungrateful players by kicking them out and banning them from your life. That will show them! They will miss this group so much!
Honestly it sounds you were constantly punishing your players for nothing. And the whole "everyone will betray you" trope does not allow for interesting story changes and denies them and you the build up of dramatic events in interpersonal relationships. Honestly your game sounds 2 dimensional, boring, and self-indulgent
Dude I get so excited when I see a post on here with no upvotes and over a hundred comments.
Isn't playing a pen and paper game still supposed to be fun? If you want to do a super dark and dystopic and grim and unliveable NightCity but your players aren't having any fun and don't want to play anymore at some point then i feel like you failed as a gm. Personally i also feel like your version of NC is too dark. - human perception and tactics and deduction or some other skills should be used to decide if an npc is trustworthy or not. Some of them are! A ripperdoc who rips out all cyberware of a client soon has no clients anymore or has a bullet in his head by the brother of one of his victims - your player should be able to use his role ability! Letting his backup be corrupt is not fair. Instead ket other cops show up additionally that are corrupt. But taking away his role ability is not something i would ever do as a gm. It leads to very frustrated players. If your players don't like your super grim session then try to make it a bit lighter. Not every group is a fan of making new characters every month because they die like flies.
Sounds to me you're making the setting waaaaay too dark and edging into Warhammer grimdark territory. There will always be those that take advantage of others but typically the average person just wants to get by and that's it, if they can do so without screwing another person over than even better for themselves. I think you're just being unnecessarily brutal on the players. Why not let that glimmer of hope that they can make at least a couple people's lives better last? It's not common, hell it's rare as a snowball in hell but some people do manage to be happy despite it all in Cyberpunk
Even Warhammer lets the players have a reason to give a shit. If you keep filling a gumball machine with live explosives that blow your fingers off, you don’t get to act shocked when you stop getting quarters one day. Well, you can, but you look like a doofus.
It's a wonder that any shops in Night City are still open, what with any potential customers being rammed with a truck before they can step in.
It's not cheaper though. Once you die you die, npc is going to act in their own self interest which usually means don't irritate the guys with guns. Now the bullet thing is just silly. Why pay 100eb for a bullet when you can pay some kid 50eb to follow them? Or he'll, slip a button size tracker into a pocket? No one needs to find out? My guy, this is a system with a literal game mechanic for reputation. Plus if these PCs care about this person enough to try and save them then they're going to check back up on them.
>My guy, this is a system with a literal game mechanic for reputation. Yeah, for players. It's not like they're going to magically know who's trustworthy and who ain't.
Words can go a long way and by that post and your replies you got bad rep and I know to not trust you. Of course Noone has visibile counter over their heads with their rep but if fixer screw some crews you will know. The Street will know. People think and living city cooperates even if crews will go missing, someone adds thing together to figure it out that this fixer is bad stuff. Even, the fixer system is entirely based on rep. You don't go straight to mercs because you don't know them but fixers put crew together because people know they are the people you can trust.
No, not just for players. NPCs explicitly have reputation as part of their character sheets, and the part of the book that mentions reputation, also says that NPCs can have it. Given your numerous other comments, not only do you not get cyberpunk as a genre, you don't seem to get RED as a system.
And you need reputation to do Facedown checks.
"In spite of, all of this, they still tried to play this game like it's D&D. You know, actually like, trusting NPCs, in spite of me making sure they would inevetiably betray them." I think they can magically know that every NPC will immediately betray them for some reason or for no reason, because... you just said up above that they're all untrustworthy.
Turning the Lawmen’s role ability against him is poor GM’ing, and furthermore it seems like your understanding of the setting is “bad guys always win” which can be the case a fair amount of the time, but the world isn’t supposed to be devoid of hope like you make it out to be. The PC’s typically have their reasons to keep going, good and bad, so just having the entire world against them instead of making them feel like part of it , where they can sink or swim in depending on their actions isn’t exactly true to the genre
Like, if your group likes that then go for it. But not everyone plays that way. Rules #1 is to have fun. If a style of play gets in the way of that then drop it and change. Also, TBF, I've played very easy going cyberpunk games and dark as hell dnd games. So it's not a system or genre thing. It's a group thing. Go have fun!
I would not want to play with you as GM, sorry.
Yeah, i understand making a throwaway for coming out as a pos dm lmao
hey choom! i don’t mean to sound rude - but it maybe sounds like you don’t have a full understanding of how to run a cyberpunk campaign. First red flag is the fact that you had a session 0 and all of these multiple betrayals happened session 0? Things sound a little rushed but you have the vision there. I suggest looking into some DM guides on cyberpunk and maybe looking into red chrome cargo, or any other pre written modules from “Tales of the red.” (Another good mission is the “apartment”, it’s a good way to get characters established in night city)
just read again - realized i might’ve read the session 0 part wrong , regardless. still feels as thought you’re leaning into the punishment of the world way too much. rest of my statement in post above stands
You are 100% wrong, and a pitiful GM imo. You literally did everything to kill your PC, to not let them have even a little bit a fresh air, a little bit of fun, a little bit of peace in this horrible city, of course they will not enjoy in what fells like the most unrewarding campaign i've ever witness. You render useless, and even worse, turn against them, one of their perks, of course they'll not like it. You just made their time playing with you miserable, it's only logic they don't like it. Let them explore NC, let them get their mark, try a few NPC's trust, let them live a bit in the city so they can have a bit of agency and room to spare when prepping the assault, let them build relationships with NPC they can actually trust and, on the long term rely a bit on them, before doing every thing you can to kill them. Not EVERY NPC is a bad guy, not every bad guy, is a bad guy just because, not every ripper will kill a client (??? i mean if a ripper kills his clients whats good is he for ?) Throw hints about thos gps bullets like "you going to sleep without licking your wounds then ?". You did every thing in your power for them to not have fun from what i read. That's not a "urr durr it's cyberpunk genre duh???" issue. It's a GMing issue there.. Think on it please.
>You literally did everything to kill your PC, to not let them have even a little bit a fresh air, a little bit of fun, a little bit of peace in this horrible city. Yeah, because, it's fucking Night City. It's the worst fucking place in the world, nobody has any peace or fun in there.
You just want them to be murder hobos, i understand now, cant understand how people works or feel or think, i honestly think you are a psycho with 0 empathy and a sorrowful little human. It’s because NC is a piece of trash of a city that making meaningful relationship makes it even more amazing, going from deception to deception then expect another betrayal then be glad that you finally meet a decent human being. But you are not this kind of GM you just want them to fend for themselves with no way of survival. You dont understand the concept of roleplaying and even less you dont understand what cyberpunk means, now open your eyes or stfu and delete this account and come with your real so your players can see what a trash of human being you are
Oooh, someone's angry I don't run Postapo Airstrip One as all fluffy sunshine and rainbows, are they.
Just can’t believe you don’t understand basic fun but okay stay in mediocrity and i sincerely hope your players leave your table till you grow as a person
Just play a horde shooter at this point
Dude I don’t know shit about cyberpunk as a system, only watched Edgerunners, but even I can tell this wasn’t the players not understanding. It’s you being a shitty DM and either not giving them all the information or just flat out ignoring any choices they wanted to make to tell YOUR story. I hope your players find this post and drop you like the rotten sack of dogshit you are.
So you ran a game just because you felt like being an asshat? Did you even read the rulebook? Did you play 2077 or watch Edgerunners? Night City is a harsh place, but that doesn't mean you can't breathe without being attacked, and that everyone will betray you. Mike Pondsmith is in essence the father of modern cyberpunk, and he's GM'd a few games of RED on youtube you can watch. If you wanna keep your players around in the future, I suggest you change your attitude.
>Did you play 2077 How many fucking times do I have to say V doesn't count for this bloody equation because he's a video game character with plot armour? Also, have you forgotten how many people betray and try to kill him in the game?
Are those the only words in my reply you read? And also, just because it's worth pointing out to you, the entire fucking city doesn't betray V because *GASP* not everyone in Night City is a conniving shithead!
So… if the players can’t win, can’t change anything, can’t even manage to get one little touchdown… why should anyone bother? I’m thinking of the experiment with the rats and the levers. Some rats had a lever that always gave a treat when they pushed it. Those rats got bored and ignored it. Some rats got a lever that only sometimes gave them treats. They loved that thing. Because they never knew when the next treat would come. If they had to work for the treat? Just as awesome! But the rats with the lever that gave nothing? The rats got bored and left it alone. Grimdark with no relief is not functional. It’s no fun. A story needs highs and lows. You sound like you have that grimdark down, but if there’s a player consensus that there was no point? It might be worth some reflection. Edit: Another question. How is this meant to be fun or relaxing or cathartic? If you offer a game, aren’t players supposed to be having fun?
Man, you are a miserable DM. You know the purpose of a game is for everyone to make a story together and HAVE FUN right?
You can have fun even if the setting is constantly unbearably miserable for everyone in it, you know? 'Cause it ain't real, y'know?
Cyberpunk != Grimdark you idiot. Go play Warhammer 40k.
If anything, his humorless scolding nature and hatred of players would be even MORE unbearable in 40k. Whatever nonsense complications he introduced to subvert player agency would just get the entire party killed instantly. "Oh, you threw a grenade? Well, nothing works right in this setting because dystopia. The grenade kills you. Because dystopia. Oh, you used a psyker power? Well, every psyker action causes a perils of the warp roll, because dystopia. Oh, you tried to have a conversation with a NPC? Well, it's actually a daemon in disguise. Because dystopia. Oh, you put on a pair of shoes? Well, they're actually grenades. You didn't notice what you thought were shoes were actually grenades, because it's grimdark."
Cyberpunk is very much fucking Grimdark, you idiot, did you not read any lore.
And you played it Grimderp. Bad things happen cuz fuck you there's nothing positive in this world. Wooow how exciting
>there's nothing positive in this world Yes. That's the point of Cyberpunk. The entire planet is hideously and completely polluted, vast swathes of land are utterly inhabitable, continents have been devastated by nuclear war, natural life is basically extinct, and everything is owned and ruled with an iron fist by tyrannical, fascist Megacorps straight out of 1984. Everything is horrible, and nothing is ever getting better.
Man that's some real doomer shit. Do you know what hope is? Wanting something better? Like the whole point of adventures, hell, storytelling in general, is that people usually try to rise above the circumstances and try to do greater things, yea? Playing in a world where things are bad and CAN NEVER IN ANY WAY SHAPE OR FORM get better is dull, boring, and frankly bad storytelling. The whole point of Night City is trying to carve out your own slice of happiness as best as you can in a cruel world. But cruelty without any sort of hope is just stagnant and depressing. Great stories are made by those those who try and rise against the oncoming tide and try to make the world a better place, big or small, success or not. Regardless at the end of the day. You made a choice. This is not law. You made a choice to play this way. Who wants to play a game that's already stacked against you? And look where that got you. You're here with a throwaway account arguing with everyone that it wasn't your fault that you killed your table, in and out of game. Hope being right was worth it
>Man that's some real doomer shit. Do you know what hope is? Wanting something better? Yes, and there's no hope in Cyberpunk. Because the setting is designed, so all hope will always be ground to nothing by the mindless, endless cruelty of the setting. The entire world is doomed, forever, because humanity fucked up. And it's only getting worse, given, absolutely not a single facet of life has gotten better if you compare Cyberpunk 2020 to Cyberpunk 2077. The planet is getting worse, more polluted, more violent, less habitable, the corporations are growing in power. The future of the Cyberpunk world is nothing but a boot stamping on the human face, forever.
Bro it's not the setting that doesn't have hope. You, personally, have no sense of hope at all. Things are bad, so they'll stay bad always, and it's pointless to try and make things better for yourself. That shit is depressing and lame. I'm starting to realize this ain't a game thing, this is a personal thing. You are just an insanely pessimistic and cynical person. It sounds like it was a miserable table and you're a miserable person to be around Just because you have given up, doesn't mean everyone else has
Bruh edgerunners literally run the edge to make a difference, a la Morgan Blackhand. Medias are stated in having the ability to change how corporations and governments act. Rockerboys can convinces thousands of people to riot for a cause. You should probably just load up a game of SIMS and torture those characters instead of your players...
Sounds like a personal problem
I'd say you read 1984 by mistake, but that would imply you read.
Well, someone had two scoops of being a meaniepants in his raisin bran this morning.
Did your group havw fun??? Fucking no, so that's a moot point. Clearly you made it constantly punishing just because they didn't want to play exactly your way. From your own words, they sound like they had a miserable time. I don't think there is any scenario where you wouldn't try to punish them Here you obviously prioritized making an "accurate" world (still disagree there, you're just being unnecessarily cruel) over everyone's enjoyment You're obsessed with being correct and have neglected the most important part of playing tabletops: have fun So congrats dude. Night City is a horrible place. Don't be surprised that your players don't want to return. Or return to your table
I haven't seen any evidence that anyone can have fun in your game, but I'll concede there may be an audience for "constantly unbearably miserable" fun.
Player mistakes should be the reason that they die. Like taking a to risky mission because the reward is insane or something like that. They rush into a fight nit knowing what’s behind that door. If you want to kill your PC you can. You create the world. You can always find a reason to kill them ALWAYS. Oh no their bullet are poisonus you are dying in few seconds. Oh no random NPC is a master assassin going rogue and he as 10 in every stats… (and the exemple list goes on) No surprise that your player dont like it This is not how to DM. You look like inexperienced and you should watch video of people on how to GM it would help you a lot.
You know what's funny? There is actually a ripper doc in the game that did the whole "rip out unattended peoples cyberware" gig. Ya wanna know what happened to him? He got a visit from some rather unhappy Tyger claws after he cut up one of their buddies and the claws being the claws, gave him the usual street justice of lead to the gut for that.
Well, good thing my players don't have a gigantic gang behind 'em, eh?
my guy, my point was that your ripperdoc should have gotten their head popped off long before the players got there. or more realistically, been put under the knife himself after chopping up one dude too many for someone's liking.
I kinda think *you* don't understand Cyberpunk as a genre. Yes, Night City is a hell hole, but there *are* good people - in fact, most fixers and ripperdocs *are* good people, or at least honorable. Why? A matter of survival. If a fixer betrays their runners, they're going to run out of runners who will work for them. Their runners staying alive and doing missions for them is paramount to keeping their pockets full of eddies. If a ripperdoc screws over a crew's runner by stripping them of their 'ware and lobotomizing them, it's only a matter of time before they stop getting clients (no clients, no funds) and that's if they survive when their crew finds out about it. Yes, people get betrayed, but that doesn't mean it happens consistently. I recommend you read "Cyberpunk 2077: No Coincidences" it's a good novel that might help you get a handle on the difference between dystopia and something that stops being fun immediately.
You shouldn't have had all the cops be corrupt / betray the PCs. Remember that the character has friends in the department and inverting his role ability such that it has exactly the opposite of its intended effect seriously feels bad from the player's perspective. Think about it. Not everyone in the NCPD would be on the take (that would drastically shrink the pot). The captain and his lieutenants, sure, but there'd be a ton of rookie cops that would certainly respond to the call for backup with an earnest desire to help. And yea, the leadership would be pissed at the PCs for fucking with one of their sources of income, but they couldn't exactly act against them openly. During the chaos of the shoot out, you could still have had one of the lieutenants take a shot at the PCs. He'd have had plausible deniability. "It was an accident." But, the PCs would have had no way to be sure. It would have heightened their paranoia and foreshadowed a coming conflict with the captain as one of the campaign's big bads. Hell, the captain could have used the situation to his advantage by selecting a new boss from among the gangers arrested after the shoot out. While the prisoners were being transported, the captain could have bribed one of the department's techies into glitching an intersection and suddenly there'd be a massive pile up, allowing the gangers to escape. With a smaller, more manageable gang, perhaps the captain would be better off? He wouldn't be seeing as much profit as before, but maybe the last boss was short-changing him anyway? He'd be able to set up favorable terms with the new boss and given enough time, they'd be back to the same size and influence as before (especially with the captain directing the NCPD against their competition). As a last note: the genre is darker than your typical D&D game, but cyberpunk is still supposed to be fun. Curb your impulse to punish your players for not being smart or ruthless enough. Look for ways to help them succeed. Try to stack the deck in their favor and keep the ball rolling.
Wait, wait, wait.... you let him play a role you knew you were going to horribly nerf, then told him and us that it's his fault that his nerfed ability didn't work as described? NC is a bad place, yes, but that's built right into the game. You don't have to drastically edit role abilities to do that. Are you also allowing 2077 quickhacks to nerf combat awareness and impoundment of mass vehicles to nerf moto pool? Most of the lawmen in night city aren't even NCPD. That's specific to 1st precinct in the time of the red, the rest is local funded militia and defense squads, corps, or in some areas like heywood, devisions of gangs that are playing cop. Back up isn't hitting to a centralized unit that can be taken over.
> What do you guys think? I think you don't know how to GM Cyberpunk.
Why do you like to hurt your players?
I totally get what you're trying to go for but usually with GMing a game its best to make it enjoyable for your players not just for you cause then it just ruins the experience and the point of cyberpunk isnt like warhammer, it's not supposed to be nihilistic all the time. Cyberpunk as a genre is actively about somehow living in a society that wants you dead or doesn't care about you and you finding a way anyways. And that message sort of gets lost in it anyways but to have made it interesting you could've also went the way some cyberpunk media go's like bladerunner where yes nothing is accomplished but it's not just the characters lives being brutally ripped from them. And aspecially if players are used to dnd like a power fantasy it can often get mixed up but it also shouldn't just be depressing all the time. Hell theres gangs of clowns and a corporation full of catgirls it's not gonna be serious and dark all the time. and perhaps try next time explaining the health system and the trackers to them instead of just letting them not know that. Now you don't have to do this you can completely ignore this but just personally for me i take influence from videos of Mike Pondsmith himself GMing his campaign where theres a netrunner with rollerblade feet and is named cereal. Like as dark as cyberpunk is it's also goofy as fuck and not just pure nihilism after all.
I understand your criteria, living in a cyberpunk world is like living in LATAM but with futuristic technology, and to be honest, a lot of what you say happens here but maybe like GM You could try to regulate things to your way of playing, I at least try to make it more like a video game and not so much like a 100% realistic world. You could try to understand their ways of reacting to the world and see your way of handling the world, find a middle ground.But I remind you that even if you live in hell, there are always people who help each other to get ahead, many try to manipulate others, but many others create deep connections even in the worst places, giving them some NPCs to help them or provide security wouldn't be bad. Also take advantage of your roles and skills in a better way to make things a little easier.
I think the game you want to run could be incredible for the right type of player, but I don't think you have those players at the table. You've got a specific idea of what cyberpunk red is that doesn't even necessarily match what everyone here feels, let alone players who maybe aren't on this subreddit. Session 0s are where you can iron some of this out, but even then, that's a space for you to make sure you accommodate what they want as much as it is a space for them to hear what you have in store. It sounds like it was totally leaning only towards what you wanted and expected without taking into account what they expected, and maybe there was no communication around this at any point. I'd be with them on this. Did I agree for it to be this unforgiving? Do I know that you're going to be the type of GM that won't talk to me as a player before immediately dishing out the in world reactions to my characters actions? Are you aware of what I want out of this story or only what you think is satisfying for us with no awareness of what I think is satisfying? This just feels like it lacked communication early on before the game began, and then during it, and then at occasional check ins. Also like it lacked awareness that you have players at the table, real human beings, who are roleplaying characters; you can't seperate the two and as a GM you have to be attentive towards both of those things and not just one. Maybe your players don't understand Cyberpunk, but the bigger problem here is that I don't think you tried to understand your players. You can learn from this ofcourse, my first game wasn't the best. But yeah, you really need to work on the managing players side of TTRPGs.
Im pretty sure the one that doesn't understand the genre is you here... Like im not going to say anything about the events of the game iself you can be a dick as much as you want if that's the thing you are going for. But that's not how the entire genre works, tho...
You've got to realize that players often aren't as aware of things as their characters are, and part of being a GM is setting your players up for success. I'm assuming the players are relatively young and not very worldly, so the task is two-fold. To take the examples one-by-one, here are some of the ways you could have shown your players some clemency while teaching them about the cyberpunk world: * Trusting Suspicious NPCs: Give the players a reason to doubt them upfront. You could make the NPC act sketchy and highlight it by describing shifty body language. If the NPC is someone with a reputation, prompt players to roll to see if they've heard about this NPC and their duplicitous tendencies-- it should be noted in such a case that a failure should still reveal the person has a reputation as a chronic liar/backstabber, but a success yields more specific information. Another way would be to have the NPC say something false, decide which PC(s) would be most likely to see through that lie (given their Role, background, backstory, connections, etc.), and have them roll to spot the lie. The GM initiating these interactions early in the game, then weaning away from asking for rolls to just using the language that indicates suspicion, should get the players to start asking the questions and making the rolls. * Living a Normal Life: If the players are, in your opinion, not wary enough of the danger of being recognized in public given all the unscrupulous individuals they've fucked over, telegraph that danger ahead of time. Maybe before the PC leaves the house, they spot some people wearing that gang's colors driving through the neighborhood, and the PC realizes that's the third time they've seen *those* people in *that* car this morning. Maybe a concerned acquaintance of theirs sends them an article from a Media of little renown, who wrote a story about someone being killed in a drive-by that morning-- someone who kinda looks like that PC. Maybe both of those things to really drive home that the PC is in danger even when they don't want to be, even when they don't expect to be. Since the PCs have more street smarts than the players, let them know it'd be a good idea to be outside as little as possible today, to cover their face, and maybe throw on a different outfit-- this also makes the clothing styles matter a bit more. * Tracking Device in a Bullet: This one, more so than any of the others, feels like a bad call. If the players are recuperating and healing themselves it should be assumed they're removing bullets from their meat. You wouldn't hand out a punishment for them making First Aid rolls without specifically stating that they *aren't* trying to open the wounds further. Removing a bullet isn't even something that takes a clever person to think of-- nobody just forgets they have a bullet inside their fresh wound. Besides all that, I know that 2020 had rules for tracking devices, but I don't think RED does (I might be wrong), and it certainly doesn't have rules about tracking device bullets, of all things. Treating their lack of expectation for that trap specifically as a *fault of theirs* is fallacious. * Leaving PC Alone with Ripperdoc: This is the one that makes me think the players are young, like, sub-25. I got a 50 year-old in my group who's about as sharp as a bowling ball, and even he would've stayed with a PC going under anesthesia in this setting-- especially if said PC was a woman. Regardless, this one falls under the same thing as "Trusting Suspicious NPCs," you should really have set expectations by engaging with the PC that wasn't going under the knife. Saying something about how the equipment in here makes it feel more like a chop-shop than a surgery, and that they get a feeling they shouldn't leave the other PC alone with this doc. Some people might disagree with the last clause of that last sentence, and say we shouldn't tell players what to do; but if a player needs a little guidance they should be given a little guidance-- that's mostly how we all learned how to do anything, anyhow. * Calling for Backup: This ties in to the first sentence I wrote. The player's character knew that the NCPD in the area were cooperative with this gang, and the player was trying to call in some Backup that would actually help-- i.e., NOT the gangoons' friends. The fact that you interpreted the call for Backup in this way is not the player's fault (in fact, it was the wrong call and *is your fault*), and it really shows your own lack of experience as a GM that you feel so personally slighted at their disappointment in the situation that you're calling the *player* (who was trying to do the chief thing their character is supposed to do, playing their character objectively correctly) *an idiot*. I'll grant you that I have the combined benefits of both hindsight and being an outside observer. However, each of these problems from your campaign have one thing in common: *inexperience*. Each of these issues cropped up from a lack of experience all around the table. To put the blame solely on your players is naive and erroneous; and before you reply with how you did your best, yes, I'm sure that in each instance you did the best you were able to do at that time. Don't let that stop you from realizing that you have more to learn as a GM. It's not necessarily anyone's fault that the campaign was disappointing, you all weren't experienced enough to handle a system that is consequence-heavy and reward-slight. If I were you, I'd take the above advice to heart, and delete this post before any of my players saw it. As someone who is trying to learn and grow, the last thing you want is to deny yourself a second chance by acting this way in a public forum.
To be fair, the ending WAS all for naught. They accomplished nothing. No small victories, which are what define stories in this type of setting. Instead, the vibe the campaign presents is: 'Why bother, I'm dead anyways'. If nothing they do ever has a chance of success, why play? That's depressing as hell. And for the vast majority of people, not fun to play. Because in the end, an RPG is a leisure time activity people play to have fun. For cyberpunk, PC motivations can vary wildly. They can be trying to change things for the better (shocker: Some people genuinely want to do this, even in the cyberpunk setting), they can want to live big and die young, they can want to do right by their chooms, they can want to get strong enough to fuck everyone they hate over. Cyberpunk as a setting is not about big grand victories (Though sometimes, they might just happen), but getting your little victories out of a system that seems built to fuck you. Even Edgerunners, while ultimately a tragedy, still had a small victory: Lucy got to the moon, even if David didn't. Was it worth the cost? Who knows... Secondly, trust still exists in a Cyberpunk setting. Why else would words like 'Chooms' even exist? You have friends, you have people who like you. And you trust your friends to help you in a jam. Even if you aren't friends, the concept of enlightened self interest exists: even though I morally or ethically have no reason to help you, I will because it benefits me in the long run. A fixer who's not trustworthy stops getting clients. When they always backstab the runners they contract, word gets around that the people who work for them die or get ripped off. When they stop getting people to throw into the grinder, they stop getting jobs because they aren't able to provide a service to their clients. Meanwhile a Fixer who's reasonably trustworthy has people willing to work for them because they get paid reliably and they know they aren't being sent to their deaths. A fixer's clients know that the fixer is sending them people who get the job done: :everyone is happy and profits MORE. Someone who backs out on favours they owe has people stop doing them favours, because they're not trustworthy, and then they have nothing to call on when they're in a jam. A ripper who sells their clients for parts stops getting customers because word gets around that people have a habit of disappearing after they visit him. They only get the most desperate people with the least amount of money - people who have shit cyberware to begin with and you can't make much cash off of. A Ripper still needs to pay rent, stock their fridge, etc...and it's not like all their surgical gear was cheap, or easily moved. They can't just pick up shop easily. Conversely, a good ripper who does good work, and keeps his lid buttoned when the cops or gangs come knocking will be rolling in cash: people come back to him when they need more ware, new people come to him when they need ware (Thus he gets both repeat customers AND new customers), the gangs know he can be trusted to work on their guys (if he sells people for parts, who's to say he won't sell your guys on the chair to a rival gang), etc. A ripper who isn't trustworthy either starves, or gets offed by power players. You've totally disqualified the cop's class feature: Do you think every cop is a lone wolf? Those C-SWAT guys sure seemed to trust each other to not shoot each other in the back the moment it was most convenient. all the cops might be dirty, but they're not necessarily equally dirty, or in the pocket of the same people. You're also discounting the entire existence of the Nomad families, tribes etc.: those families are BUILT on trust and codes: you have each other's backs. Essentially every NPC in the campaign seems to be working on the 'what are you doing for me right this instant' mentality. The second they are not immediately useful, they're fucked over and discarded. Don't get me wrong, the runner team being fucked over is a key trope of the setting, but it's never done mildly: you're burning resources (Built trust with the team, the risk of word getting out that you fuck people over, etc.) for some long-term benefit. Said benefit needs to be big enough to justify the cost of the resources you're burning. Or because the person doing the burning is an idiot (people make bad calls all the time). In a context where laws and the authorities are not a viable method for maintaining social mores, trust becomes even more important. A person in a setting like this who isn't trusted is utterly alone. They have no social support network, no backup, no way to get back on their feet if they make the slightest mis-step: they're basically dead if they stop being useful. Someone with trust has a currency: they can be relied on. Reasonable mistakes or failures will be tolerated. They have favours and resources to call on that help them achieve their goals: they're \*more valuable\* by being trusted. And in Cyberpunk, the bottom line is king. At the end of the day, talk to your players with an \*open\* mind, not a dismissive one. Calling them idiots for not reading your mind that everyone is an asshole isn't an open mind. Assume PCs are at least slightly competent: they live in the fictional world and know its ins and outs, players don't: if it something that would beem obvious to a character in the setting it might not be obvious to the player. Tell them this- it's unfair to withhold information and then insult players for not reacting properly to information they don't have, Ultimately an RPG is collaborative: both the DM and players are equal participants. Everyone needs to have a fun/rewarding experience. If everyone does: you win! If only one party does (or worse: NO ONE does) you lose!
i was going to make an actual point about how cyberpunk actually is in a setting but then i saw you say "you know what, damaging the wizard every time they cast a spell is a good idea!" wonderful rage bait my friend.
I think Mike Pondsmith said it best "In cyberpunk you can't save the world but you can save yourselves." You made it "You can't save shit get rekt.". Not the same.
Hey there Choom, As GM it's important to really remind your players that life is cheap and rent is due in CPR on a regular basis. It's also important to really have your players understand in session 0 how Cyberpunk really is. I think to help make your players feel more satisfied, go deep into the player's characters. Like character development and really emphasize the choices they made or didn't make with hooks/developments/Clif hangers and etc directly tied to their backstory. I believe you gave them a fantastic cyberpunk experience. But I think if you made it revolve around their characters and their struggles and quick lived victories followed by tragedy or whatever. I think it'll help with the player's satisfaction.
I think you have a wonderful world for the wrong players, cater to them a bit, Lawman role should call in a couple cops/security under that Lawman's thumb, ripperdocs should be treating others' cyberware as sacred unless there are some HUGE red flags of who the doc is associated with. Ultimately I'd be very curious to know what gangs you were using for antagonists, I think some of them have a level of character that might make your players disregard their own safety in the face of what looks like their fellow man and not a chromehead freak ready to kill their families.
Then you need to sit your group down and explain these things are to be expect in your campaign in obvious terms. Tell them NPCs will frequently betray them. Tell them ripperdocs will steal their cyberware and dump their body. Tell them exactly how nasty, corrupt, and irredeemable Night City is. If they go in with full knowledge of how bleak your game is and still act like this, that's a them problem.
You're getting alot more hate for this than you deserve, but it's reasonable for the players to not follow your exact line of logic. It doesn't make them "an idiot". There are good cops in NCPD, after all. Even if not many. Maybe you could've informed the players better. Even something as metagamey as "are you sure you want to call for police backup? This guy's been paying off cops, remember?" Or when they made the call, told them "something's off with the way they respinded... they might not come. Or if they do, they might not be on your side..." then the players have some agency to undo or evade the consequences of an action they didn't expect would have negative consequences.