Elegant, Simple, and Expressive

As much as I love Savage Worlds, Cypher feels much easier to play and transfer ideas into. Where a Savage Worlds version of a setting feels like "the Savage Worlds version of a setting," Cypher feels different - almost like a stripped-down version of pool-based 5E or a d20 system with a flat 1-10 difficulty curve and plenty of room to interpret.

For me, it completely replaces 5E and does many things 5E does, but both more accessible and with greater customization and flexibility. With 5E, I am "buying books" to have more options. I have them all in Cypher and am free to make the ones I want. The 5E design is very consumerist and designed to limit options and sell new ones.

Any of my 5E books are instant Cypher sourcebooks.

Savage Worlds is sort of its own thing. It does anything, but the game requires a lot of "table toys," such as decks of cards, poker chips, standard dice, and lots of structure to make the system and toys work together. To play Savage Worlds, I need to "load" the "Savage Worlds" OS into my brain and think in that model to make the game run smoothly. I love the system and playing with all the toys, but sometimes I have to fit my ideas into the structure, and things feel lost in the translation.

In some games, like OSR d20 games, I can run without thinking and "loading the game's OS" in my head. Cypher fits into this category but also has that "box of Legos" feeling I like. The game also invited you to design your own pieces, unlike Savage Worlds, which warms against tweaking and house ruling (the GM's guide).

Case in point, I tried running a Car Wars game in Savage Worlds, and I had to make a lot of conversions and substitutions for the parts I wanted in the game. The game worked well, but it felt more like Savage Worlds - which is a good thing, in all honesty. The chase rules and vehicle combat relied on the systems and routines built into the game, and while they are designed for the most fun, I felt confined to that structure.

I didn't know how to fight combats with vehicles with Cypher, but the game had a simplified resolution system. For most cars, you could say "they are all sort of equal" based on a "maxed out" design for level one thru six cars. A level 1 vehicle is a light cycle, and a level 6 is a van. The vehicle combat system is very abstract and works for cinematic combat. If a van is weaker than the best-in-class design, lower its level.

Car Wars typically runs between "best in class" designs, and the weapon selection is mostly flavor. An abstract system uses a generic "handle a road combat" sense.

Is that the only way I can do it? No. I could make each car a "creature," give it a level and amount of hits and figure "damage as level" like creatures. 

I could eliminate "leveled damage" and give each vehicle weapons and large gear slots equal to the level, an armor value, and do it that way. Treating "vehicles as creatures" would work well and let me make custom "creatures" for different vehicle types and customize them with assets and inabilities. Weapons are like Cypher, a 1d6 MG is a light weapon, 2d6 weapons are medium, and anything heavier is a heavy weapon. Single-shot weapons get a bonus, like ignoring armor or bonus damage.

It works.

Is it the way the game says to do it? No. But it works.

I could stick with the game's "leveled cars" system, still do the "spaces" thing, and allow one modification or unique piece of gear per vehicle level, such as a targeting computer to ease attack difficulty. Some cars are "higher level" at attack than defense. A flamethrower would give a devastating attack up close but be worthless father away (or fired to the front while moving). Weapons? Assume they are on there, and what they are is flavor. Unarmed vehicles? Just say they are or increase their defenses or cargo if there is weight to spare.

I could develop "vehicular cyphers" to put in those slots and have something more interesting than stock Car Wars. The possibilities are endless.

All of it works.

Emergent Gameplay

One of the great things about a solid "sim" game is the emergent gameplay the experience generates. We had this with the Aftermath game back in the day, and I have this with GURPS today. You get into melee combat, and you get all sorts of exciting situations to come up when your character gets their hand stabbed and needs to fight with the other, a goblin gets stunned and falls off a cliff, and the game's "sim system" generates a story for you.

If you can slog through the rules, the system rewards you.

Then we move to the "hot thing" in many games today, with many random tables. Emergent gameplay is created through table results, which enforce a theme and mood depending on what can happen. One of my favorite games in this genre is Dungeon Crawl Classics, and I love the tables in this game - with one huge caveat:

The tables are not an endpoint; they are a starting point.

Given what a table result gives me, I am free to replace it with a similar effect from my imagination or better appropriate for the situation. Once you start to know the tables and the dice ranges, this gets easier to "break away" from the charts - and it enhances the feeling and mystery of magic once you do.

I know why we need charts - they surprise us and break our habits. Play too much of games with too many rules, and your imagination goes away.

But there is a danger where charts shackle us and limit our imagination. I have a rule, I never roll twice on a chart. If the first result I get does not excite me - I must make something new. I can use the result as inspiration or ask myself, "what would be the most fun?" And "most fun" can be harmful too if the chart produces a negative result, like "what is the worst thing that could happen?"

So in comes Cypher System. A game I did not understand and sat on the shelf for months feeling like a mistake. I even had this boxed up at one point.

Oh, I was wrong about this.

This is a game where "making it up" is the rule. I rolled a one-use cypher, an "attractor," which I think is a magnetic thing, and it did not make sense for the character. Keep the result and let the player figure it out, right? I had that "not happy" feeling, so I asked myself, "what else can attract things?"

A bottle of pheromones, perfume, cologne, or scent.

Then I had it. This was the most fun thing, and it had very little to do with the chart result - but it worked incredibly well. The player was happy, I was delighted, and we had an excellent, new, one-use item to play with that felt great.

I could have easily made this something else that "attracts," like a flare gun, signal beacon, homing tracker, a pistol that shoots a market dye pellet, magnetic glue, charming attitude, magnetic personality, irresistible advertisement, or anything else that attracts X to Y. On the flip side, I could have taken the opposite word, made a "repulsor" item, and potentially doubled my potential creative inspirations.

Then I stepped back, realizing I could do that for any die roll, result, or action in the game.

I know, it sounds silly.

But play too many games with strict rules that limit your creativity and too many charts that tell you only a few results are possible, and suddenly you aren't thinking for yourself anymore.

You are following what is written in a book.

And never going beyond that.

The authentic "emergent gameplay" exists in your head, and no amount of rules or charts can replace it.

Mail Room: Numenera Discovery/Destiny

A new game is here, and I am looking this one over.

All I can say is wow, with one nails the science fantasy Appendix N feeling perfectly - but then, takes a step beyond. More soon.

Cypher Character Creation

I got through character creation. While it appeared very obscure and complex to follow at first, the procedure on page 17 with the PDF hyperlinks is the way to go. Go through exactly as they tell you, and do not even think about backtracking! Here's a tip:

Copy and paste every power, choice, and selection you make into the form-fillable character sheet.

The official Cypher form-fillable sheets have the room to do this, as long as you put enablers on the second page and "point costing" abilities on the first page. Use the page-2 background box for your arc, player intrusions, GM intrusions, and other notes.

So, what do I think?

This system makes a lot of "narrative system games" obsolete for me, such as FATE, Index Card RPG, Genesys, and a few others. I still love these games, but this does all of them so much better. This also makes 5E obsolete for me since it does so much more under the same sort of framework.

In 5E, your characters are limited to what Wizards gives you. You need to open your wallet to get more options.

In Cypher, you DIY build the character of your choice out of a menu of powers organized into grouped and themed selections, and some of these sections "level up" with you. One book does it all.

It is like a version of 5E where you break component classes down into building blocks, like a druid's natural powers, a fighter's battle abilities, and a thief's sneakiness - and you allow players to mix and match those blocks any way they like to build characters. You can ever do X for Y swaps if you really want something.

I need to do some play sessions, but once you have characters built, the system melts away into the background. The GM presents the story and sets pass-fail challenge difficulty for every critical moment. This part of the game feels indistinguishable from D&D's flow, except the referee never rolls dice.

And the Cypher system is setting-neutral; it can do anything from cavepeople to end-of-time sci-fi.

The characters are interesting. Even ones without "tons of combat skills" feel robust but slightly more prone to failure (and need to exert more effort to do the same thing as a skilled character). I have a party of characters without "trained combat skills," and I still feel good about them. Will I buy weapons and combat skills? The game only allows that when it is explicitly said by abilities, like the second-tier warrior "Skill with Attacks" or "Skill with Defense" abilities. So you can't just increase combat power with generic skill picks.

In short, the base combat effectiveness of all characters feels good. Warriors are better, but everyone can have fun fighting and feel capable.

I can see why some call this their perfect "desert island game." I could replace four boxes of 5E books and three shelves of Pathfinder books with just this one book. Would I play those games exactly? No. Would I be doing the same things? Yes, with a better framework for how the game is run and flows and infinite options for creating characters in any genre.

When I was done, the characters felt like 5E characters, but this was for a modern setting, and everything worked smoothly. My options "per character" felt like great 5E classes, and any concept I came up with worked well with the design system and gave me the opportunities I expected.

Do I lose low-level rules granularity? Yes, but I have GURPS if I want to play games where goblins get shot in their right hand by an arrow and know what exactly happens. This game does that "narrative streaming" sort of play you see on steaming "let's play" shows like the game was made for online play. If the referee never needs to roll dice, there is no need to show that; the referee can act as the storyteller in a more decisive and assertive role. If the difficulties are known by all, there are no "secret dice rolls," and the play is much more followable.

Overall, this is an impressive system once you get past character creation. Well worth your time and investment since it replaces the need for many games and opens up your creativity across a wide range of genres.

Backerkit: Cypher System, Final 6 Days!

https://www.backerkit.com/c/monte-cook-games/adventures-in-the-cypher-system

It is the last 6 days for the Backerkit for the Adventures in the Cypher System campaign. This is a great chance to get a bunch of cool add-ons and a deluxe rulebook, so it is worth jumping in if you are interested.

Cypher System: The Ultimate 5E?

The more I read this game, the more I feel this is the ultimate version of 5E you could ever play.

Yet it is entirely different from 5E.

If you boil the essence of 5E down to its component parts and throw out all the rules, class options, spells, feats, and all the other D&D things - you have the following framework:

1. You create a character who can do [actions] with [abilities] using [equipment] and [consumables]. Or, in short, "things."
2. You collect new things as your character advances.
3. Your character possesses [resource pools] that improve as you level, which are spells, ability uses, and health. And these are regenerated through [recovery].
4. Your pools improve as you level, and the cost to use abilities reduces.

With Cypher System, you get all the toys in one book. You do not need any expansion books. You do not need class and option expansions. You get to design everything and create any class out of the collection of abilities the game comes with.

Boiled down, you don't need the 5E rules. And the one-level dips and senseless class combos are unneeded since you design the hero you want, and they level up exactly how you would like. There are custom options too, and the powers you get are balanced and "kick in" at the correct power level.

In a way, Cypher System end-runs around 5E systems and focuses on the core class roles, and augments them with leveled power selections. Everything else is simplified to the bare minimum, and the excess cruft and rules bloat is removed. All the silly feats and "you are not a game designer" guardrails are removed. You do not have to "pay for power" or "purchase options" with expansions.

You are just left with your pools, stuff, and powers.

The game comes with a near-infinite combination of choices.

And everything else goes away.

When you look at the game as a 5E alternative, it makes a lot of sense because it factors out all the junk and leaves you with the "secret recipe" of 5E-style characters - and focuses squarely on the fun.

Why More D&Ds?

I love this take; why do we need more D&Ds? Check this video out and subscribe; I watch his videos a lot.

We have so many retro-clones, clones of every edition, new takes, fresh takes, and slightly different versions of the same thing. Why do we need new versions of 5E? We have a few out there (A5E, Low Fantasy Gaming) and a huge one in development (Black Flag).

As for D&D-alikes, the excellent and tactical Pathfinder 2e is out there.

3.5-alikes? Pathfinder 1e.

OSR? Too many to count. Gonzo OSR with Dungeon Crawl classics is the way to go for me.

Sci-fi? Starfinder or Traveller are great games.

Rosetta-stone games? Castles & Crusades is "every D&D" and is being revised to eliminate the OGL entirely.

I am playing Dungeon Fantasy, which is GURPS, and it is a fun change of pace. It clears my head and cleans my palette for all the D&D-like games I just want a break from.

And I am not going back to 5E or Wizards. They don't want players or dungeon masters like me in their "brave new digital world." They want subscription customers who play on their monetized 3d VTT. If you play elsewhere or on an old-fashioned table face-to-face with your friends - it does not seem like they want you as a customer.