[Other] Cyberpunk: Night City Blues

[Drinkslotsa]

Game Name Cyberpunk: Night City Blues

Game System Other Roleplaying Games

Theme Camaraderie, justice, shades of gray

Flavour Gritty, Neo-Futuristic Nihilism

Plot Summary NCPD NEEDS YOU Protect. Serve. Survive. Rebuild. Night City, 2045. The Fourth Corporate War has come and gone, but its scars remain. The city’s skyline, once a beacon of power and innovation, now looms like a graveyard of shattered glass and twisted steel. Streets that once pulsed with the rhythm of the future are now ruled by chaos, and the once-great corporations are more concerned with rebuilding their own empires than the wreckage they’ve left behind. Amid the ruins, the people of Night City suffer, desperate for order in a world gone mad. The NCPD is all that stands between the last vestiges of peace and the tidal wave of violence threatening to engulf the city. But the NCPD is struggling, barely holding the line. The mayor's office has been compromised, and the streets are awash with corruption, gang wars, and corporate mercenaries. Can the fractured police force restore the fragile order—or will the city slip further into ruin? That's where YOU come in. Your Mission: As an officer of the Night City Police Department, it’s your duty to fight back against the chaos. Your patrols take you into the darkest corners of the city, from the towering high-rises of Arasaka Towers to the grimy, neon-lit alleyways of Watson. Every corner hides a new danger. Every call-out is a potential death sentence. But within this lawless city, it’s up to you to maintain the fragile thread of civility. The people need hope, and they need heroes. But in a city where everyone is trying to survive, the line between cop and criminal is often paper-thin. The Fourth Corporate War shattered Night City, leaving behind a landscape of corporate wreckage and shattered alliances. The NCPD is underfunded, understaffed, and at war with itself. Gangs are running rampant, rogue corporations are exploiting the chaos, and cyber-enhanced criminals are everywhere. The city is alive with tension, and the people have begun to lose hope in any kind of order. As one of the few who still wear the badge, it’s up to you to restore what little is left of the rule of law. But in Night City, justice comes at a high cost. The Red neon of the city’s underworld pulses through every street, and everyone—from street vendors to boardroom CEOs—has their own idea of what justice should look like. Will you uphold the law, or bend it to your will? The city is waiting. Will you answer the call, or be consumed by its dark embrace? Apply now. It's your shift. Will you make it out alive? Looking For: 4-6 Players Posting rate of 1-2x a week People who are looking for more RP than combat (But should still expect combat) Characters: All 1st level Cops, players can take other roles later on, but everyone begins in blue. Name: Role: Obviously being a badge comes first, but any plans to have your character expand into other roles? Ethnicity: Personality: Appearance: Picture and paragraph. Backstory: What made you join the force? Family tradition? Looking for revenge? Want to abuse your power? A strong sense of justice? This is the perfect place to let me know your characters dreams and ambitions Important People: List a minimum of 3 people that are important to your character (alive), they don't have to be friends, they can be enemies, they can be heroes, anyone that has impacted your character in a significant way. I do my best to include these characters in game in ways I think they will fit best End of recruitment: Dec 31st, we're gonna be playing in the new year Player Character Lifepath Status Mairien Victoria Coburn Lawman / Medtech Complete NoizePollution Kishan Nurikoma Lawman / Nomad Complete Drifter One Ricky Fortune Lawman Complete Red Leper Andre Moro Lawman / Solo - Starflier Lucia Koh Lawman Complete

[HexCursed]

Which game system are you using?

[Hiruma Kohaku]

Role abilities normally start with various roles adding up to 4. Are you saying that all character role abilities will start at 1 at creation or that they still have the standard 4 but at least the 1st level is Cop?

[Drinkslotsa]

Originally Posted by HexCursed

Which game system are you using?

Cyberpunk red

Originally Posted by Hiruma Kohaku

Role abilities normally start with various roles adding up to 4. Are you saying that all character role abilities will start at 1 at creation or that they still have the standard 4 but at least the 1st level is Cop?

First level is cop with standard 4 in the role ability

[Hiruma Kohaku]

So with 4-6 players all having at least 1 level of lawman, does that mean that everyone can use their Lawman ability individually for the same result as in 4-6 possible instances of back up arriving or would you just combine everyone’s rank for one test/one result?

[Drinkslotsa]

I'm flexible with it, everyone has it individually, but if more than one person attempts to use it at once (for something small time), dispatch would be upset or there would be reprimands, but if the situation calls for it, multiples could be used.

[NoizePollution]

Hmm. Well, I did recently lose a cyberpunk game just as it was getting its hooks into me. That recruitment window is long enough for me to go back and forth about this a few dozen times. I'll give this some proper consideration after the current holiday.

[Drinkslotsa]

Pretty sure I was in that one with you. Space pirates right?

[NoizePollution]

Originally Posted by Drinkslotsa

Pretty sure I was in that one with you. Space pirates right?

Yeah. You were definitely in that one with me. All the more reason to give this one serious consideration.

[Hiruma Kohaku]

Are you allowing the Black Chrome book for additional options like weapons, armor, cyberware, and vehicles?

[Drinkslotsa]

Yeah

[Mairien]

Oh, this could be interesting! There's an idea taking shape in my head for a lawman/medtech. Good thing the deadline is so far ahead so the idea can crystalise and I can actually learn the system in the meantime, too.

To be clear, regarding the role, everyone starts the game with 4 ranks in lawman, right? And then if ever gain new role ranks over the course of the game, we might be able to use them for other roles. Am I getting this right? Or did you mean everyone has 1 rank in lawman and 3 potentially in something else?

[Drifter One]

I am so tempted to bring my Noir Cop, Ricky Fortune out of retirement....

[Mairien]

Originally Posted by Drifter One

I am so tempted to bring my Noir Cop, Ricky Fortune out of retirement....

As wise Oscar Wilde said: the only way to get rid of temptation is to yield to it.

[Mairien]

Character App Name: Victoria Coburn Role: Lawman, aspiring Medtech (generally: brains, not brawns) Ethnicity: White American, English-speaking Appearance: The girl is just pretty enough that you wonder if bodysculping may have played a role, but not just quite perfect enough that you’re sure of it. Maybe it happened a while ago. Her purple eyes and the fine lines on her body that make it look like her skin is made of panels - you’ve doubtlessly seen them, she’s not shy about showing skin when changing out of uniform - are probably just a fashion choice. In general, her pink-haired aesthetics are more those of a rebellious teenager than of a guardian of law and order - but she seems to like it that way. Image Attribution Personality: Vicky superficially acts like she hates everything and doesn’t care about anything. Including, probably, herself. But then, she doesn’t actually do a bad job of doing her, well, job, or at least she tries. And strangely, when you ask her for help, there’s a good chance she’ll tell you to sod off, and then her eyes light up and she’ll do it anyway. What is this chick’s deal? If you’re a starry-eyed idealist who believes the world can be made a better place with hard work, you’ll probably be put off. On the other hand, if you vibe with her acerbic sense of humour, she can actually be quite fun to be around. She does, in fact, appreciate friendship and company, even when she pretends not to. Backstory: Why is Vicky in the force? Who even knows, really. She herself certainly doesn’t. But it does pay the bills. The reality is probably that it’s a way for her to straddle her internal contradictions: sometimes, she gets to do something with her life, to do at least a little bit to maybe feel like she’s helping to improve this f*ck-up of a world; and at other times, she gets to risk her life because nothing matters anymore anyway and boy, wouldn’t it be nice if everything were just over already? How did she get here? By screwing up her life, that’s how. Vicky is the daughter of well-paid professional class parents. Her father was a medical consultant. She herself, however, is a drop-out from medical school: why did she screw up so much, develop an addiction first to smash and then other thingsShe’s meanwhile had enough therapy to get over it, begrudgingly paid for by her father.*, and burn most of her relationships? One doesn’t know, maybe it was just genetic destiny. She is not on speaking terms with her family, to whom she was an embarrassment. Some years ago, she learnt that her father was embroiled in some malpractice matter that tanked his career. So now both have screwed up their lives, both are pissed at each other, and they can’t talk at all because neither will make the first step. Of course, she's sensible enough not to phrase it that way to everyone, and is generally close-lipped about her familial origins. It isn't that being a lawman wasn't a respectable job, so most people wouldn't understand how she can call her life screwed up and would perceive it as snobbish, even when it wasn't about that at all. Important People: Dr. Anastasia Solomonov: An acquaintance from medical school, Anastasia is a trust-fund baby who now follows her idealism by working in a free clinic. It's not like she needs money. Her patients call her "Dr. Nasty", as a play on her Russian call-name "Nastya" and ironically because she truly is anything but. Vicky was never really friends with her, but they (now) are all friendly as Anastasia recognises that the NCPD can use any help it gets. And that includes information about, for example, people who show up with unexplained gunshot wounds or strange poisonings, or those who ask for, or have, cybernetics of dubious origin or purpose. Vicky is torn between envy and admiration and harbours a secret desire to actually befriend the other woman. Jordan Avery: Jordan is essentially your starving artist - an idealist for his music. He's not much of a performer at heart, but a tinkerer, he works endlessly on perfecting his out-there electronic sound, but constantly struggles to find an audience or make any money. This has been going on for all the ten years since Vicky met him, during a wilder time in her life. Vicky does actually like his music and, on some level, admires his devotion to it; she does believe that he's an artist that the world is wrong to fail to recognise. Maybe he will one day have his deserved breakthrough? The two have a very strange relationship: even to this day, they occasionally hook up, very intermittently, on and off. That definitely qualifies as a pity f*ck as far as Vicky is concerned. Why she still does it, she doesn't know. It's become a habit at this point. And she does like him, just not actually that way. Aloysius Hawthorne: An older officer who, in his own way, took Vicky under his wing after she had joined the force. Older, not senior - he never got promoted far, because let's face it: the man is a wreck, a raging alcoholic, and a creep; and not a good policeman, either. Or at least, not someone who knows how to please his superiors rather than cause trouble for them. But boy, does he understand people, and he wasn't shy about sharing the wealth of his advice without taboos. Vicky learnt a lot from him about dealing with people, about how police work is different for a woman than for a man, and how to conduct herself to get the most out of someone. If she had been a different type, she'd have got him written up for touching her behind the first time - but she also wouldn't have picked up nearly as much. Hawthorne has been sent off to an early retirement and spends a lot of his days with the bottle or jerking off to braindances. Vicky has a strange sort of pity and sympathy for him and still checks up on him occasionally. Once in a while, they'll sit together with a bottle of cheap liquor and share stories about f*cked-up things that happen to people, and she might ask for advice. Sometimes she wonders how easy it would be to end up like him.