Quote from: RPGPundit;1095269I haven't read all of these, but I read Neuromancer and When Gravity Fails. I don't remember the treatment of cybernetics causing the type of effects you saw in the cyberpunk game (or Shadowrun) but I may be remembering wrong?

Quote from: tenbones;1095324When Gravity Fails - The overall technology this setting is on par, but not as openly available with some specific important exceptions - the the "Add-Ons" (Moddys) technology is a big part of the setting where you can chip skills... including the personality of the person they recorded it from. The very construct of the technology fucks with your mind.

Neuromancer - I just re-read Neurmancer a couple of months ago. You might have a better case here. The setting of Neuromancer is "dehumanizing" rather than explicitly being due to technology. The main character Case's is damaged by neurotoxins and is rendered suicidal because he can't run the Net anymore. You might even say the cybertech GAVE him humanity. Especially given that they cured him of his drug-addictions with cybernetic implants.

Pretty much what tenbones said, but in the case of When Gravity Fails, the part I was thinking of was near the novel's end where Marid Audran uses the black daddy and becomes an inhuman animalistic killing machine that not only kills the serial killer stalking his neighborhood but also an innocent victim who he was supposed to save. The repercussions of that act alienates him from his friends and compatriots in the neighborhood, forcing him to create a new life.

Quote from: jeff37923;1095362AD Police episode The Man Who Bites His Tongue

QuoteThis episode stars Billy Fanword, Captain of the AD Police Spacial Mobile Squad. After sustaining massive injures due to a rouge boomer and almost dying his only remaining viable organs (brain and tongue) are transplanted into a experimental battle cyborg body. To help remind him he was once human he is seen at times biting his tongue. During the course of the episode Billy slowly loses touch with his humanity if not by a selfish and overly prideful doctor that helped to "make him" then by continuously taking ever higher does of drug DA-27 injected into his tongue to give him greater sensations that he's all but lost. It is also theorized that he acts like a tank with a human brain; smart & intelligent but with no fear of pain or death he loses touch to his human side and that impacts his performance in the field, an emotional/stimulation issue not mechanical. His ex-lover Jeena progressively tries to get him to remember his human side with no avail. After finding out the prideful doctors plan to let him die in the line of duty to rid herself of his poor performance he helps himself to massive doses of DA-27 that finally do him in. Going on a massive rampage, he kills the doctor and many of his AD Police comrades, viewing it as more like a dream than reality. Jeena is finally able to stop him with a large anti-tank gun after he pleads to her to shoot his tongue to give him pain, the only thing he has left to feel. We are left seeing his burial on the top of a high rise and Jenna reminiscing his past.

This reminds me of Erik Weihenmayer a blind mountain climber who uses his tongue to see.

It really does amaze me how far we have come compared to what people were imagining when they were writing Cyberpunk 40 years ago.

Regarding cyberpsychosis - The concept is more specific than just having some sort of psychological issues in adapting to cyberwear. The concept is that cyberwear permanently reduces your humanity, and people with a lot of cyberwear need to remove their metal in order to regain a more human viewpoint. Compared to what I think of as the classics of cyberpunk, this seems like an anti-technology theme, which idealizes low-tech.

Quote from: tenbones;1095324When Gravity Fails - The overall technology this setting is on par, but not as openly available with some specific important exceptions - the the "Add-Ons" (Moddys) technology is a big part of the setting where you can chip skills... including the personality of the person they recorded it from. The very construct of the technology fucks with your mind.

Neuromancer - I just re-read Neurmancer a couple of months ago. You might have a better case here. The setting of Neuromancer is "dehumanizing" rather than explicitly being due to technology. The main character Case's is damaged by neurotoxins and is rendered suicidal because he can't run the Net anymore. You might even say the cybertech GAVE him humanity. Especially given that they cured him of his drug-addictions with cybernetic implants.

This is on the nose for me. From my view of cyberpunk, it's the dystopian *society* that's dehumanizing, not metallic implants. An office worker with no implants is just as dehumanized here, and the punk part of it is that tech-loving hackers are actually gaining humanity by their mods and hacking. There are lots of people who are crazy, it doesn't correlate with technology. i.e. The better-adjusted people aren't the ones without technology and only their natural brains. People without tech are all the more confused and isolated in the topsy-turvy world that technology has created.

Quote from: DimitriosI recall that something like cyberpsychosis was clearly portrayed in Robocop which came out in 1987 and CP was released in 1988. Maybe that was part of the inspiration?

Quote from: tenbones;1095325Yeah I don't think most people could easily deal with that level of bodily replacement.

I can see this as an inspiration - but Alex's lack of humanity wasn't an accidental side-effect of his bodily replacement. It was an *intentional* part of the operation. The company wanted an operative that was programmable, with no prior memory, but still having some of the context and situational awareness of a human. I think that's a hugely different theme from an individual who goes psycho because they have too much cyberwear. The point of the film was that Alex was still *more* human than the technologically unmodified corporate suits.

Cyberpsychosis and humanity loss from tech adds a lot to the setting and gameplay of CP2020, regardless if it works as direct genre emulation. In fact, it should be seen as Mike Pondsmith's contribution to the genre instead of some sort of failure.

Yes, its a game balancing mechanic, but its one with vast setting implications that increases the dystopian feel during gameplay. To me, that's the best kind of mechanics in any game.

Quote from: Spinachcat;1095411Cyberpsychosis and humanity loss from tech adds a lot to the setting and gameplay of CP2020, regardless if it works as direct genre emulation. In fact, it should be seen as Mike Pondsmith's contribution to the genre instead of some sort of failure.

Yes, its a game balancing mechanic, but its one with vast setting implications that increases the dystopian feel during gameplay. To me, that's the best kind of mechanics in any game.

Agreed. It emphasizes that the dystopia itself is dehumanizing. Seen this way, cyberpunk is humanity rebelling against dehumanization.

Quote from: RandyB;1095423Agreed. It emphasizes that the dystopia itself is dehumanizing. Seen this way, cyberpunk is humanity rebelling against dehumanization.

Hell no. Humanity, or a certain part of it, is deliberately riding on the edge of dehumanization.

I know I was the one that brought up the idea of "society being de-humanizing" as an observation. But I was on my Throne of Contemplation, and in between grunts, I realized that was a cop-out thought. Here's why.

"Humanity" as a gaming mechanic is speaking to an absolute spectrum. Degrees of "humanity" in terms of environmental conditions is not. It only dictates the conditions under which optimal and less optimal *amounts* of "Humanity" can exist. In other words, it's *difficult* to have high "Humanity" and live optimally in a de-humanizing environment.

But you CAN do it. It's a choice by the individual. In order to even make that choice - in game terms - you have to have a high Empathy stat.

The inverse of this is true as well. Choosing to do live optimally in a de-humanizing environment is most optimal by pursuing implants that lower your humanity. Nothing prevents you - in setting - from going either direction. In fact, I think this is the best argument against Pundit's roundabout assertion that Humanity exists only as a mechanic to stop players from getting "too powerful".

Because getting cyberware as a conceit of the game isn't difficult. SOME things are... but if you really want 95% of what makes going fully 'borg possible in ghetto-mode (i.e. no specific borg-chassis - just total ad-hoc replacement) it is actually quite trivial. Just takes healing time and money/parts. And let's assume Humanity isn't even an issue for the sake of discussion. Nothing prevents this. Even as a player you can stack your stats for maximum Humanity expressly for this purpose. And we all know why people want to go full borg: to put the metal down for maximal ass-whipping. Right? Well this also parallels my assertion that in a de-humanized world maximal optimization for survival would require less "Humanity"...

My contention is the *REAL* conflict here, the point where the rubber hits the road in cyberpunk fiction is the *tension* between staying "human" vs. the lure of "dehumanizing" by ones OWN volition because you're willing to chance the consequences of that act.

The supporting claim to this idea which supports the idea of Humanity/Strain/Sanity mechanics is that in CP2020, to those that are under the misapprehension that going full-borg is the end-all be all of combat are *sadly* mistaken. Because if you're running the kind of campaign when PC's can and do go full-borg for the purposes of gunning down dozens of people... those are the same campaigns where you can arbitrarily just pull out Powered Armor from Maximum Metal - which outperform most actual Borg Chassis (from the same book) and cost PRECISELY ZERO humanity to operate and do the exact same thing, even on a greater scale.

TL/DR Humanity mechanics are not to limit players for reasons of power-gaming. They're there for roleplaying purposes where the conceits of the very genre are to create tension between the PC and the environment itself.

Quote from: RandyB;1095423cyberpunk is humanity rebelling against dehumanization.

Quote from: Alexander Kalinowski;1095426Humanity, or a certain part of it, is deliberately riding on the edge of dehumanization.

These are two perfectly good character concepts for cyberpunk. You can be the PC who rebels against the societal dehumanization, or you can be the PC who surfs the dystopia, and both these PCs exist until the dystopia swallows them whole or eats their souls piece by piece.

Quote from: Spinachcat;1095454These are two perfectly good character concepts for cyberpunk. You can be the PC who rebels against the societal dehumanization, or you can be the PC who surfs the dystopia, and both these PCs exist until the dystopia swallows them whole or eats their souls piece by piece.

I have discovered that I can only claim independent discovery of the "rebellion against dehumanization" idea.

Quote from: Listen Up, You Primitive Screwheads!!!!, p. 93Cyberpunk is about the dehumanization of man, and the primordial urge to return to "humanity."

This has likely been said but look how dehumanizing a handheld computer you can put in your pocket has been. It's not a far stretch to imagine cyberpsychosis being a thing.

Style over Substance
Attitude is Everything
Always take it to the Edge
Break the Rules

Quote from: Alexander Kalinowski;1095740Style over Substance
Attitude is Everything
Always take it to the Edge
Break the Rules

I believe that was in Pee Wee's Playhouse Season 1, Episode 3.

Quote from: tenbones;1095447My contention is the *REAL* conflict here, the point where the rubber hits the road in cyberpunk fiction is the *tension* between staying "human" vs. the lure of "dehumanizing" by ones OWN volition because you're willing to chance the consequences of that act..

You're talking as though changing Empathy stat means something in game on a sliding scale, that someone with an Empathy of 5 is different to someone of an Empathy of 0.1. They're not. Despite being a number, in game terms in CP2020 Empathy is either/or. It's either above 0, in which case play on, or it's 0, in which case hand your character sheet to the DM.

This differs from Cthulhu's Sanity in that, while starting SAN meant nothing, losing Sanity gave you a chance to acquire various mental disorders along the way. This had the strange effect that someone who gradually whittled down from 95 to 10 SAN ended up with more problems than someone who went from 20 to 10 SAN.

What you are saying would make more sense if the CP2020 Empathy stat were tied to other things, for example you lose contacts and patrons as your Emp declines, or become more likely to be sent on suicide missions, etc. Of course this can all be roleplayed, my point is that it's not baked-in to the rules as it is with Sanity.

Quote from: RandyB;1095727I have discovered that I can only claim independent discovery of the "rebellion against dehumanization" idea.

Excellent! Then I will steal it directly from you!

It's a great "rage against the machine" concept. It's not just "rage against corps", but "rage against the tech that's devouring us all".

Quote from: Kyle Aaron;1095819You're talking as though changing Empathy stat means something in game on a sliding scale, that someone with an Empathy of 5 is different to someone of an Empathy of 0.1. They're not. Despite being a number, in game terms in CP2020 Empathy is either/or. It's either above 0, in which case play on, or it's 0, in which case hand your character sheet to the DM.

This differs from Cthulhu's Sanity in that, while starting SAN meant nothing, losing Sanity gave you a chance to acquire various mental disorders along the way. This had the strange effect that someone who gradually whittled down from 95 to 10 SAN ended up with more problems than someone who went from 20 to 10 SAN.

What you are saying would make more sense if the CP2020 Empathy stat were tied to other things, for example you lose contacts and patrons as your Emp declines, or become more likely to be sent on suicide missions, etc. Of course this can all be roleplayed, my point is that it's not baked-in to the rules as it is with Sanity.

The Cyberpunk 2020 Empathy stat is tied to other things, skills and your ability to use them advantageously. Human Perception, Interview, Leadership, Seduction, Social, Persuasion & Fast Talk, and Perform are all skills that use Empathy as a base stat when it comes to making a skill roll. It is baked-in to the rules.