CY_BORG RPG: Core Rulebook

A Fast, Flashy and Vicious Cyberpunk RPG

Cyberpunk fiction tends to focus too much on flashy tech and not enough on the dystopia, but Cy_Borg, by Christian Sahlen, has absolutely no problem dragging your shiny character straight through the mud. The game welcomes you to a world that’s been ground down by capitalism-driven ecological disasters, mysterious infections rumored to be from outer space, and warring corporations looking to use chromed-out punks like yourself as expendable fodder to settle their violent rivalries. The city of Cy is one that’s immediately hostile to you, but it makes for one of the most compellingly vicious cyberpunk RPGs on the market.

While the game has wonderfully streamlined rules and concise worldbuilding, the first thing you will notice is the art. Like its predecessor Mork Borg, the doom metal fantasy game that provides the stylistic and mechanical basis for Cy_Borg, this book is aggressively laid out with gorgeous illustrations by Johan Nohr and some of the most unique formatting you’ll ever see in an RPG manual. Every page changes in color, font and spacing, making just the act of flipping through the book a treat for the eyes. Not only is it a visual feast, but the art acts as a perfect tone setter for the overwhelming, flashy, and brutal world contained within the text.

CY_Borg... A Nano-infested doomsday RPG about cybernetic misfits and punks raging against a relentless corporate hell.

The world is ending.....

Again and again and again and again and again a̶n̴͗d̵̥͒ ̸̎ă̶ġ̸a̵̢͗i̶͙̓n̸̡̔ ă̵̢̫̥̺̻̞n̵͔̽̿̏̓͋͠͝d̴̢̪̟͊ ̵̡̺̖̰̯͖̞̓̑̐̈́̍̋a̶̤̘̖͗͐̀̔̚̚g̴̛͇̻̦̻͇̲̈́̏à̷̩̫͒ḯ̷̡̱̀̀̀͠ṇ̶̦̔͜.

Constantly in flux; shifting, d̵̃is̴to̴rt̷in̶g̷, always reborn as something worse. Destruction by ecological catastrophes, the fallout of history's belligerence; by modern man-made Miseries or the blood spilled by the reckless machine of capitalist supremacy. Mankind's greatest ability truly is to destroy itself in creative ways. Designer demise, consumer-customized death, endlessly on repeat.

Poisonous space rocks, nuclear weapons, cyclical revolutions, warring nations, warring corporations, warring neighbors; pandemics, tsunamis, volcanoes. In between it all: direct person-machine interfaces, tactical neural implants, and bacteria from outer space hijacking intercellular nanorobotics. And the sky is full of ads.

Everyone is interfaced/injected/in̴fe̴cted̶/infested with something. Everyone wants something from everyone else. Everyone is a liar and a cheat. Everyone wants more creds.

Welcome to the year 20X3.

Welcome to the City of Y!̸͆̅̌”̶͌̉#̸͇̞̻̌̚”̶̨̻̘̇̉̊͆̈́͒̌̆̓̕͜#̶̖̣̘̻͖̥͕̙̀̃̈́́̄̕̕͜͠2̶̧̻̺̝̥̮̣̒͒̂͐͐̍́́͘̕̕4̴̿̌’̷̛̙͍̠̙̿

The Cy.

CY_BORG is a complete rules-light, rage-heavy tabletop roleplaying game based on and compatible with MÖRK BORG. Easy to play, easy to hack.

In it you’ll find:

• A drive-by description of the megacity Cy after the Incident: from its rotting slums where gangs, cults and military corporations wage war, to the blinding scraper forests, neon cathedrals and holo-shimmering arcologies of Central and the toxic industrial hell zones shrouding it all in poisonous (but CYstainable Planet™ Certified) death smog.

• Quick and dirty character creation where the roll of the dice determines who your punk is, what they’re capable of and who they owe money to.

• d66 Miserable Headlines making the rounds on the news and feeds with varying regularity, each one heralding chaos and destruction wracking the city until the cataclysmic conclusion seven headlines in. 

• A minimal, simple system designed to stay out of the way and to be easily modded and customized. Rulings before rules. MÖRK BORG at its core, with a few tweaks and updates.

• Optional rules and tables: Add tactical crunch to your violence with combat mods for cover, suppressive fire and more. Six classes for your class war, including the Forsaken Gang-Goon, the Shunned Nanomancer and the Renegade Cyberslasher. Tables adding depth and character to your punk, such as Style, Quirks and Current Obsession.

• Random Generators facilitating near-endless play: missions, locations, corporations, cults and npcs populating the accelerating apocalypse.

• Equipment (of varying legality) like guns and specialized ammo booster plug-ins, intelligent body armor, cybertech, decks fitted with custom Apps, and almost-controllable Nano powers with their latent infestations.

• 25+ foes to fight. From the countless soldiers of the SecCorps and gangs to corrupted Nanophreaks, soulless drones and cydroids, state-of-the-art combat vehicles and the ethereal, digital apparitions classified as Ghosts.

• The introductory heist Lucky Flight Takedown. Scope and infiltrate the Lucky Flight Casino, clear the debt data and/or shut the whole operation down. Should be a quick and easy job, right?