Look interesting. Definitely focused on the dystopian aspects of cyberpunk. System is like Mork Borg, so OSR adjacent, thus looks like fast deadly play.

Here's the KS from last year for those who never heard of the game.
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/jnohr/cy-borg

Has anyone PLAYED the game? If so, definitely want to hear your actual play thoughts about it runs at the table for a campaign (which is designed to be short I understand).

If anyone's read it cover to cover, want to hear from you too.

I backed it on KS and ran the job that's in the back of the book (a bit of a rescue/get blackmail info) as a one-off when I got it.  We tend to play the *borg games as one shots when enough people can't make the normal session so some of us had a little experience already with the system.  Overall, it went alright.  This was months ago so my recollection of details won't be great, but I'll try.

I let the players pick their class, but the rest of character creation was random following the book's rules.  We had a Burned Hacker, a Discharged Corp Killer, an Orphaned Gear Head and a Renegade Cyberslasher.

After getting the job the group decided to case the casino.  One of them went across the street and found a vantage point in a derelict building, 2 of them went inside and "blended in" for a while.  The guy in the building failed to notice a Cy-raging Menace in standby mode when he moved through the building, so he had a close encounter of the nasty kind when it detected him.  Combat was fast and pretty brutal.  If it wasn't for the little bit of armor the PC had he would have been dead right there.  He managed to escape and lose the thing in the streets.

After pulling all their info together they tried to get through a back entrance where the entertainment comes and goes.  Unfortunately, they couldn't bypass the security locks and had to settle for the employee service entrance.  This, IIRC, was partly due to bad rolls and partly because starting characters seem a little weak.  I made the locks difficult, which I think meant they needed a 14 or maybe a 15 on a d20+ability score.

Anyway, after finally getting in (they chose to go after hours to minimize the number of people inside) they moved around, found some info they didn't know what to do with, cornered the owner and negotiated a deal with him for what they wanted and then shot him once they got it.  There was a brief showdown with some private security outside the secure room in the basement they were trying to get into.  Again, the fight was quick and brutal.  They took the security down in 2, maybe 3 rounds, but one of the PCs got tagged pretty good.

They managed to complete the job, but realized when they went to collect, they got played.  Due to the negotiation with the casino owner though, they still walked away with more then they lost and managed to get a new pad in a place that wasn't quite as run down as where they started.

Generally, I liked it.  I think half my players did.  Two of them are more passive players and in the *borg games I feel you need to be more pro-active.  The free character/NPC/Job generator is nice and seems to produce decent results but I haven't played with it too much.

For campaign play, it, like Mork Borg, has a doom clock counting down to the end of the world.  You can adjust how fast it ticks down, which extends how much time you have in your game world. I think it ranged from daily to quarterly.  I don't think it went as far as yearly.  The time determines what dX (from d4 up to d100) you roll and on a 1 the clock ticks down.  After the 7th tick the world ends.  Each "tick" before that has some game changing revelation/event that happens.

Mork Borg is okay.

Cy_Borg is good.

Pirate Borg is fantastic.

Quote from: Thornhammer on July 18, 2023, 12:08:32 AM
Pirate Borg is fantastic.

Pretty much!  I ran a demo and LOVED IT!  Very easy to get into, and a very evocative setting.

rgalex, thank you for the detailed actual play. Very interesting. How do you feel Cy-Borg compares to other cyberpunk RPGs you've played/run?

Thornhammer & Tait Ransom, why is Pirate Borg so good?

Compared to others I've played/run it is probably the one I'm least likely to choose to run a campaign with.  I think the setting is so nihilistic (which I know is kinda the point of the *Borg games) that at most I'd keep running it in a more episodic way.  Run a few sessions of a job in between other games we're playing.  The players could keep their PCs or make new ones each time.

Again, compared to other games, it doesn't have the depth when it comes to hacking.  You get apps that are more like class abilities with the chance for fumbles (the game calls them glitches).  If you have players that love diving into cyberspace and doing all that they will likely be disappointed.  It does solve the issue of the hacker/rest of the group split though and keeps the action moving.

I think that's the big takeaway there.  It's fun, quick to get going and designed to keep the action moving.  IMO it is much more "here is a group doing everything they can to survive the cyberpunk nightmare" and not "here is a rag-tag group of runners trying to stick it to the corporations".

I will agree that Pirate Borg looks great.  I haven't had a chance to read it, just flipped through the book.  It is dripping style, just like all the other *Borg books and seems like a great Pirates of the Caribbean game.

I'm also looking forward to Castaway.  It's billed as a survival horror RPG for 1 or more PCs.  You wake up on an island and have to survive until you get rescued.  It uses the Borg rules but adds in things for common afflictions (starvation, heat stroke, etc), camp building, hunting, gathering, crafting etc.  The island has locations to go explore for resources and treasure.  It seems like there is a slight supernatural aspect to it, but you could probably easily remove that if you wanted to keep it more grounded.

The Borg games are books that I would simply buy for the art. They look so nice. Especially CY_BORG. It is just my kind of thing. It is a pity the creators are such...

Quote
You are encouraged to break every single rule in this book. Except this one.

Rule #00

Player Characters cannot be loyal to or have sympathy for the corps, the cops, or the capitalist system. They might find themselves reluctantly forced to do missions for them or their minions. But make no mistake—they are the enemy.

It is something stupid, but it actually brings some authenticity to the whole style of book: I didn't shy of reading science fiction zines from back in early days of the whole cyberpunk genre, and they were invariably very leftist and very revolutionary.

Despite my love for the Borg books, I can't see myself actually running them. Maybe I should take a page from rgalex and play it as an one-off, no commitments to go beyond that one session.

Quote from: Spinachcat on July 18, 2023, 04:08:01 AM
Thornhammer & Tait Ransom, why is Pirate Borg so good?

It uses the same easy system of the other two (plus a naval combat system), but the atmosphere hits the groove better. As someone once said - with a delivery like a brick through a plate-glass window.

It helps immensely if you liked Pirates of the Caribbean, because it is absolutely that with the dark turned up a couple of notches. Zombies, skeletons, magic, a huge rift that opened up south of Jamaica because some assholes played with Dark Forces.

It has an absolute ton of random tables that are excellent for any general pirate game. Random island generator from the guy who did Hot Springs Island, random derelict boat generator, random carousing table where you can discover that last night you fucked a pig and ended up tied to a stake and missing a leg.

Reminded me a great deal of On Stranger Tides - the book. The voodoo loas from that fit perfectly, as does the Souragne domain from Ravenloft.

I liked Cy_Borg, but I'm inspired to actually run Pirate Borg.

Another minor point - Pirate Borg is easy on the eyes, in a readability sense (black text on a whiteish background or vice versa) and the majority of the artwork is done in a muted, subtle coloration.