From: ratinox@meceng.coe.northeastern.edu
Newsgroups: rec.games.cyber
Subject: Cyber HERO
Date: 10 Sep 92 23:08:55 GMT
Reply-To: apple!meceng.coe.northeastern.edu!ratinox
Organization: 3WA, Boston Office. Or Nu Meta Chi. Take your pick.
Archive-Name: rgc591

Picked up my copy today, and I've got a few comments to make.

First, a bad one. The cover seems flimsier than previous HERO stuff.
It just feels thinner to me. Maybe just me, tho. It's covered in clear
Contact paper now, so it should last a while. Overall, the artwork is
good; not too much, either. And (thank [insert favorite deity or
deities here]), none of the hype that pervades R Talsorian Games'
stuff :-). As the authors put it, "punk" means being an outsider; if
everyone is "punk" then by definition *nobody* is.

Anyway, this is definitely a sourcebook, not a worldbook. Lots of real
nifty stuff in here. It starts off with a set of Package Deals
representing the "definitive" character types: Street Sam, Net Runner,
Medic, Rocker, Media, etc. It then procedes into the standard
Characteristics description. Normal Characteristic Maxima are enforced
with an iron hand: you need cyber to go beyond the normal maxima :-).
Then skills, talents, perks, and powers (for making cybernetics). The
disadvantags section has lots of evil and nasty things, too. The first
section finishes up with not two or three, but *fifteen* sample
characters, one for each Archetype, including an Artificial Persona
(AI). Characters are built on the Competant Normal scale, 50 + 50.

Netrunning seems to be the largest section. The authors have done a
very good and creative job of translating HERO mechanics into
cyberspace. Even more than cybernetics, creative use of Powers have
defined the Gibsonesque cyberspace very well. Lots of creativity in
the variety of programs here; the netrunning stuff really pushes the
limits of HERO mechanics.

A short section on how to use Cyber HERO in a campaign, at varying
power levels, much like a similar section in Ninja HERO. A lot of
stuff on campaign limits and optional rules leads up to the section
I've been waiting for the most...

Cybernetics. A lot of stuff was translated from ICE's Cyberspace into
HERO mechancs, and the translation looks like its gone very smoothly,
from the neural interface, up through chipware and skillsofts. I do
have another complaint here; they start the "cyberpunk equipment"
section with a lot of headware, the shift into more mundane equipment,
before stepping up to the real cybernetics. But reasonable monetary
costs are listed in neat tables next to the Active and Real point
costs for just about everything; very useful. Almost thirty pages of
armor, gear, toys, stuff, you name it. Then the real good stuff.

Cybernetics are bought with Character Points and money, and are built
with Powers. Cybernetics have a set of common limitations, much like
weapons and armor do, plus limitations specific to the body location
the cyber is grafted to. They even have a "Cyberpsychosis" mechanic:
all cyber has Side Effects in the form of Mind Control, which shows up
in times of stress. Graft on enough cyber and the stuff can drive you
insane. Again, very complete tables list cyber systems with Active,
Real, and dollar costs, something like 12 pages including the tables.
Equipment is finished off with weapons and vehicles.

The last 60 pages of the 224-page book is lots of source material, an
array of Corporations to use and abuse, the obligatory slang (4 pages
worth :-). San Francisco is laid out as a typical 21st Century Sprawl,
along with gang descriptions and a series of introductory adventures.

The first appendix has conversions for ICE's Cyberspace to HERO, an
overview of ICE's Cyberspace supplements, skill selections for
"average" members of 20 gangs and 5 law enforcement/vigilante
organizations. The second appendix is a reprinting of the Cyberspace
timeline from 1993 to 2090. And the final appendix is, of course, the
bibliography. Lots of Gibson and Sterling, George Orwell's _1984_, PK
Dick, Steven Barnes; strange is no references for WT Quick.

Overall, this looks like one of the better sourcebooks to come out of
HERO, IMO.

--Rat