OK, next question from the new guy
It seems like the Sprawl intends cyberware to be ubiquitous. However it is so expensive that nobody could afford it. Badassess at the top of their game can get one, maybe two, pieces of cyberware and to do that they have people hunting them down or effectively owning them.
Am I interpreting something incorrectly?
Not only badasses can have cyberware. You may have cheap shit done in a back alley. Or you could have cutting edge, military grade ultra tools if you just give them your soul in return. Or your memories. Or your next ten years of labour.
There is cyberware for anybody, if you just pay the price. Such is the virue of hypercapitalism.
Cyberwear is easy to afford. Just let the Corp install it. 😀
Seriously though, every PC starts with one piece of cyberwear, and often has a move that allows a second piece. After that, yes, you have to buy it with cred. But that’s kind of the point of the game. If you want more cyberwear, earn cred by taking those missions.
What about average people on the streets? Do they have implants that let them record or playback sensations. Do they have implants that let them interact with augmented reality stuff.
Kirk Foote Ask your table. That is open to you.
That’s for you and your players to decide when you start the game.
In the game I’m running, the average citizen has high-speed wireless internet access, near limitless storage capacity, and the ability to interact with AR stuff. In most cases though, it’s not implanted cyberwear. It’s consumer-grade Corp stuff. Meaning the Corps have huge control over and access to all the data your average citizen consumes and generates.
I would say basic implants could be fairly common, insofar as being +Owned by a corporation is fairly common. The average person would probably engage with AR through an external headset, though.
Cyberware being a right pain in the ass to acquire is one of the things that irks me about the system, though, I’m with you on that. If you read the book, you’re evidently supposed to get the implant (for probably a lot of cred, which is hard to earn), hire a surgeon to implant it (for more Cred, and you can only ever get a middling bonus on the surgery roll so things will probably go badly), and then you’re still supposed to spend an advance on it on top of that.
I mean, I guess the idea is that the ‘ware that PCs use is specialized and expensive, and it’s only aesthetic mods and the like that are more common. Augments show up as a Look option in some places, but they don’t cost you anything or give you any mechanical benefit. That stuff is probably more affordable to the average person.
The idea i am currently mulling over is that cyberware is ubiquitous. Cyber eyes, prosthetic limbs…etc are all common and readily available. However anything that produces actual mechanical benefits is the expensive stuff.
Anyone can get cyber eyes that duplicate human vision. However if you want enhanced recording capability or real encryption you have to pay the price.
I’m with +Kirk Foote
There’s cyberwear and then there’s CYBERWEAR.
The lower case cyberwear is the stuff anyone can get. It doesn’t have any special abilities and basically just duplicates what a normal human body can do, but is all shiny and chrome. Clinics practically give this stuff away (1 – 3 cred).
Then there’s the uppercase CYBERWEAR. This is the stuff that the military/corporate guys get. It looks just like the normal stuff, but lets you: see through walls; hack like da-leet masters; hide a shotgun in it; override the safety interlocks on a drone/vehicle; etc…. It’s highly regulated. When you pay the 8 cred, its not just for the chrome, but for the ‘right’ to own it (so it doesn’t get flagged as stolen every time you pass a security checkpoint).
Yeah, seconding what others have said about kinds of cyberware. Basic consumer-grade stuff, pretty common, though even top-of-the-line consumer gear (e.g. Apple’s new VR implant chips) isn’t going to come cheap. Artificial limbs that do no more than replace a real one, they’re easily available… your employer might even pay for it if you’re a valued employee.
But the kind of thing professional cyberpunk operatives would use? Not so much. Regular citizens don’t have combat-focused cyber-limbs, artificial eyes with night-vision zoom-lenses, or advanced hacking tools implanted in their brains. That’s not the kind of thing you can pick up at the local mall…
I tend to lean towards ‘Unless it has rules, go for it’. A current PC of mine is borderline full body cyborg. On the other hand: None of it has rules as it’s not a serious advantage to her. It’s only her ware that gives numerical bonuses/tags that needs to be paid for.